


Slayer Tales - A Matter of Trust

by ElimClement



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/F, Female Relationships, Fights, Isolation, Ogres, Original Character(s), Tales of the Slayers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-30
Updated: 2014-02-08
Packaged: 2018-01-06 19:15:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 28,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1110533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElimClement/pseuds/ElimClement
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Julie Blanchard, a slayer of the 1960's, questions her loyalties when she meets a mysterious woman. Will she find a better life or mortal danger?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fanfiction and serves no commercial purpose. I neither possess nor claim any rights to BUFFY, THE VAMPIRE SLAYER or anything connected with it that is under copyright protection._

_When I wrote this story, I tried not to contradict established Buffyverse canon. Any inconsistencies have to be judged under the first rule of Whedonites: "Joss is boss." ;-)_

_\--- Maine, 1966 ---_

_You fool, Julie, how could you let them lure you into a trap? – Goddamn vamps!_ Julie cursed herself, while she slowly felt the dizziness from the hard blow to her head disappear and her vision recover. Dizziness and blurred vision were not really of help while she struggled to fight off the two vampires that had pounced on her immediately after sending her down with a thwack. The dimly lit barn rotated before her eyes, even though she was lying on the floor. She found that her eyes would probably betray her more than help her right now, so she forced herself to close them. It was not easy, since her instincts told her to watch her enemies. But there were other instincts that she had to trust right now – those instincts of hers that were not human in origin. She let them take effect, allowed them just so much time as she could reasonably afford, with the two creatures over her, ready to tear her apart. Then her right elbow jumped up, punching into the throat of the vampire that had just moved forward towards her neck with his fangs extended. _Glad that vamps are so predictable_ , she thought as the creature recoiled, emitting a smothered coughing sound. _Even if vampires don’t breathe, they don’t take it lightly when their windpipes are smashed. Hurts them too. Buys time…_

She was not so sure on which part of her body the other one was going to strike. But she had a notion that should not betray her. Again she waited for the blink of an eye, until a hand touching the cloth of her skirt just above the left knee gave her the final confirmation. The hand was moving swiftly, but Julie was prepared and knew what to do. She would not let this animal remove her dress and sink his fangs into her thigh. With a quick, forceful movement she tried to roll back over her shoulder. She clamped the head of the vampire, who was just getting low to bite, between her leg and her belly and spun the attacker around. The vampire cried out angrily, more out of surprise and frustration than pain. But the sound of his cry changed immediately into a deafening shriek of pain when Julie, who was now half lying with her shoulder on the dirty wooden floor, half above her enemy, got a grip of his head and turned it around violently. Julie felt the body under her leg go limp and returned her concentration to the other vampire.

 

She managed to disentangle from the immobilized opponent and get onto her feet. Though still impaired by the dizziness, Julie was somehow able to use her eyes again without embarking on a merry-go-round-trip. She made out the shape of the first attacker who had likewise recovered and was rising to his feet. Hastily she gazed around in the darkness of the barn. It was only lit by moonlight and by the dim glow of a lonely street lamp in the distance. She knew that the bad lighting was to the advantage of the vampire. Yet all she needed to find was... there! A small shadow hardly more than a yard from where she had gone down. She moved two steps forward and grabbed after the object, hoping intensely that she was not a victim of wishful thinking, but really discerning the shape of what she needed to find. A smile crossed her face when she felt her hand closing around the familiar form of her stake. The vampire with his superior sight noticed from his position that his enemy was now up and armed. She was as dangerous as she had been before the fight had started. The only difference was that now he was on his own, while his crony still lay motionless. For an instant he hesitated, and then he bolted out of the door.

 

Julie headed after the creature. She was not willing to let a vampire escape, much less one who had knocked her down and had been within inches of sinking his fangs into her neck. But again, darkness was to her disadvantage. After just two steps, she stumbled over something heavy. Julie realized that it probably was the same piece of steel that had sent her down before when it nearly cracked her head. She avoided the fall, but could no longer catch up to the fleeing enemy. When she left the barn, she saw the shape of the vampire melt into the blackness of the forest. Julie cussed. She knew well that further pursuit would be useless at best.

 

She found her torch light where she had dropped it. It lay on the lawn, close to the gravel path that led to the barn, on the spot where she had been patrolling when the first vampire had attacked. Then Julie returned into the barn to check on the other vampire. He still lay on the floor, his neck unhealthily contorted. She directed the torch light at his face, which had now become human-like again. He looked almost attractive. _That was a cute young guy before he was sired_ , she thought regretfully. But she reminded herself that this was no human anymore, and that the handsome man he had once been was dead. He had been the first victim of the demon that had taken possession of his murdered, soulless body.

 

"Get that light out of my eyes! You bitch broke my neck!" the vampire exclaimed among moans of pain.

 

"Watch your tongue, buddy!" Julie replied unsympathetically, "and it's not broken, only strongly dislocated. The braking of a neck is much noisier, you now. More like a cracking sound. And either way, it would heal. You abominable creatures have an enviable ability of regeneration. Within a couple of weeks or maybe just days you would be jumping around like a puppy in the sun - or well, not in the sun, probably... But for sure you would be eager to move on with your favourite pastime of slaughtering women and children. But you see, I have a bit of a problem with that outlook. On the other hand, it seems somehow not sportsmanlike to terminate you while you’re immobile. Fortunately for you though, there is no need to stake you." She walked to the door, looked out into the full moon, then turned around and walked back to the vampire’s side. She squatted beside him and looked into his face that showed a mixture of despise, fear and confusion.

 

“You see”, she continued, “this is the barn of Charles Frederiksson. Very nice family, the Frederikssons. When I was a child, their daughter Anne and I were very close. I often came over to visit her. We played in the hay, had lots of fun… And every now and then, when there was a really warm summer night - very much like this night actually - we slept here out in the barn. Oh, we really loved that! It was an adventure for us nine year olds. I remember we liked to tell each other spooky stories about ghosts and monsters. Gee, back than I had no idea how many real life monster stories would be in store for me later in my life.”

 

Julie sighed. Her voice changed.

 

“Since my calling, Anne has somehow withdrawn from me. I guess she sensed that I kept secrets from her. Or maybe the calling has changed me. In fact I know it has. She was not the only one that started to feel uneasy…” She looked into the darkness in front of her, saying nothing for some seconds. Even the vampire, baffled and unsure about what the slayer was up to, but vaguely hopeful due to her comment about not staking him, kept silent.

 

“Anyway”, she said with a sudden change of tone, “whenever we had one of our sleepovers in the barn, we placed our blankets almost directly here, where you are lying now. Isn’t that a funny coincidence? And do you know what was so special about this spot? See, as the barn is facing east, it was always so wonderful to be woken up by the first light of the sun entering through the doorway. To this day I remember the beauty of that shining ball over the lake and the dark forested hills in the background. And how the sunlight used to tickle our noses! Well, you’ll experience it pretty soon. Just maybe you won’t enjoy the tickling as much as we did.” With those words, she gave a last cold look to the vampire whose eyes were now wide open in horror. Unaffected, Julie rose and walked out the door, leaving the helpless creature to its fate.

 

\---

 

Reporting to her watcher didn’t cease to be among the most unpleasant of the young slayer’s responsibilities. For twenty minutes already he had been giving her a telling-off about the stupidity of pursuing her first attacker into the barn without checking for potential accomplices luring inside, and how stepping into this trap and being beaten down with a massive piece of steel could have gotten her killed. It was not that Julie would not have agreed on the stupidity part – she had had enough time to dwell on that subject during the last hours while she felt the bruise on the back of her head become bigger and more painful to touch. Also the nausea on the way back home after sunrise brought the same message home. Yet she was annoyed by the way Mr. Northcutt kept rubbing it in. As on many occasions before when he was unsatisfied with her performance – and he was unsatisfied all too many times, and surely more often than it seemed justified in her eyes – she felt that he insistently wanted her to humiliate herself by admitting that she was a fool and a disgrace who never proved worthy of his tireless efforts to make her a capable slayer. In turn she got angry and defensive; even started to justify her mistakes, against her own better judgement. That reaction seemed to affirm his opinion that she was a failure, and their conversation got ever more tense and aggressive. Julie felt tired. This situation was recurring again and again and it unnerved her more every time.

 

Finally Northcutt let go of his reproaches for bad fighting tactics and moved on to other complaints.

 

“What silly game was that about letting the paralyzed vampire be burnt by the rising sun? Forget your sadistic impulses, and don’t play with your enemies like a cat would do with a mouse! When you have a vampire immobile at your feet, you stake him instantly! Fooling around can be your downfall. What if he had just feigned and attacked you again?”

 

“He would have had better chances to do that while I was concentrating on his pal. And it was quite obvious from the way he lay there that he was not feigning. I’m not an idiot.”

 

The watcher seemed not convinced about any of those points.

 

“I told you again and again that you should never be too sure. Vampires are treacherous creatures. They love to attack and butcher head on when they have superior strength than their opponent, but they can also use every kind of deception if they meet a strong enemy. The bruise on your head should tell you that!

 

And did it even cross your mind that a burning vampire could have torched the whole barn? If someone saw you patrolling in the area, you might have had police interrogating you for arson in the morning.”

 

Julie felt uneasy. She had assured herself that the vampire lay on a clean piece of floor, far away from straw or anything easily inflammable. Yet it was true that she would not have been able to do very much about it if the whole building had gone up in flames, and the potential consequences of being brought into connection with the destruction of Gunnar Frederiksson’s barn would have been very unpleasant. But she was not willing to concede any misgivings to Northcutt.

 

“Did it cross YOUR mind”, she replied in a huffy voice, “that I may have had a good reason for not staking him, but letting the sun finish him off? I really didn’t feel too well after the fight, but I waited for two hours close to the barn to see if the second vampire would come back to look after his crony. I certainly felt more like going home and falling into bed, but I waited until the sun came up. Just wanted to be sure that I would not let the opportunity slip to finish the fight and take out another vampire.”

 

He seemed taken aback. Julie felt she was winning an argument. That didn’t happen too often. She could not resist capping it all off. “It’s a good slayer’s duty!” she remarked.

 

Northcutt didn’t seem as impressed as she had hoped for.

 

“And did he come back?” he asked.

 

“No, he didn’t”, Julie had to admit.

 

“Or he did, but spotted you much earlier than you could have seen him. Lying in wait for a vampire in the night is quite a futile exercise.”

 

_So much for wining an argument_ , Julie thought. It just was no use. The watcher always had to rub it in that she was not playing by the book – or probably some ancient council’s scrolls for that matter.

 

Two hours of training in chilly atmosphere and a not much warmer good-bye later, Julie was on her way home. She walked the familiar path along the lake where Northcutt lived, and then along the road that led to the small center of her North Maine hometown and further to her parents’ house. Like on many occasions when she followed that way, the slayer mused about her unpleasant conversations with Northcutt. It had been two years since she knew him, yet their original antipathy had never really died away. He had moved to Greenfall only days after her nightmares had started. She had been in fear and confusion at that time, so when the townspeople talked about the close-lipped biologist from England, who had moved into an old wooden house at Lake Sapins in order to study a rare species of frogs for a perennial science project, she had hardly taken note. That was, of course, until the strange man had approached her on the way home from school. She had walked faster initially, until he had asked her bluntly if she had had bad dreams recently. That was the day she learned about her calling. The day she learned she was a vampire slayer. THE vampire slayer.

 

In order to perform her training and instruction, Northcutt and Julie had agreed that she would volunteer to assist him in his frog studies as a cover up. That way she could explain why she spent so many hours after school at his house at the lake. They had even invented a series of experiments about nocturnal behaviour of frogs, which would oblige her to help out after sunset, when in reality she had faced her first real vampires. Julie always expected that sooner rather than later townspeople would start gossiping about her spending so much time alone at a single man’s house, hidden in the woods, half a mile away from the road. As much as she was disgusted by the thought of having an affair with the grouchy old man, it would have been absolutely no surprise if some bored people had come up with the most raunchy tales. But, much to her relief, nothing of the sort ever occurred. Perhaps the mutual dislike between Northcutt and her was too obvious to everyone, so nobody could ever assume that the two of them would be attracted to each other in any way. Probably people just wondered why she did not quit her science volunteering and still kept visiting the biologist. She let the word spread that she worked mostly on her own when she was at the lake, seeing to the experiments, while Northcutt followed some other tasks, and that they did not interact very much. So somehow she had managed to make everyone swallow her story, although most people were very astonished by Julie´s intense fascination of frogs.

 

_Those nightmares…_ They still haunted her and made her wake up sweating many nights. But she had understood their meaning when Northcutt had told her that they sprang from the memories of all the slayers that had come before her. Night after night she lived their fights, felt their victories and their defeats. And sometimes she felt their deaths…

 

The memories were always blurred; faces and events intermingled and became vague. But the feelings were intense. And beside the anxiety, thrill and pain of the fights, occasionally she ‘remembered’ also the emotions for people that had crossed the slayers’ path and, in most cases, were now equally dead and gone – many of them only remembered in Julie’s dreams. Through the eyes of the previous slayers, she also saw their watchers and experienced the girls’ sentiments towards them. Mostly those were sentiments of deep respect and trust, sometimes feelings like one would have for a father, occasionally even romantic feelings – although she was sure that they were not appropriate. But neither was it fitting, the dreams told her, that a watcher should scorn his trainee, bashing her every action or decision. Many watchers had been tough on the slayers they were assigned to, but still they had always managed to prod them to become better fighters, to follow their missions with determination and prudence – _until, eventually, they all found their end_ , Julie added to her thoughts with a shiver.

 

Not exploring the last concern any further – she had decided not to go there long ago – she returned to thinking about herself and Northcutt. She felt pity for herself for not having the same kind of trustful relationship with her watcher like all these other girls had. It was not fair. Being the slayer was hard enough; why did this additional hardness hit her of all slayers? Admittedly, she could not really argue that Northcutt was not training her well. He had taught her a lot about demons, vampires, had explained to her how she had to fight them and that she had to follow her instincts during the encounters with the nocturnal creatures. His instructions and drill had helped her keeping the upper hand on quite a number of occasions. Yet, as for emotional and moral support, he failed. Maybe he thought that his criticism could motivate her, maybe he even thought that it worked. Yet ultimately, Julie knew, she had to fight alone.

 

\---

 

Lost in her reflections, the slayer had come close to her parents’ house. She saw warm light coming out of the kitchen window. For a moment, Julie was tempted to walk inside, collect some friendly words from her mother, maybe spend the night. But then she changed her mind and walked by the large house to the smaller one-storey wooden building that lay 200 yards further down the lakeside. Not very much more than a hut by modern standards of the 1960’s, that house was her place of refuge. It had been her family’s home for more than a century until her father had built the new comfortable house closer to the road. But her grandmother had chosen to stay in the old place, and Julie, who loved her granny immensely, had spent most of her childhood days there with her. Later, after she had been called, she had practically moved in. Julie had been isolating herself not only from her friends, but to a degree also from her parents and her little brother. For some time she had felt that her granny was the only person she could stand – or had it been the other way around? Had Madeleine Blanchard in fact been the only person who could stand her granddaughter?

 

Either way, granny had meant very much to her, and when the old lady had suddenly died from a stroke last winter, Julie had been devastated. She had decided to stay in her grandmothers little house, the place which gave her comfort and consolation. Her father, seeking to support his daughter even if she dissociated from the remaining family, had even signed the old family home over to her for her 18th birthday. That had been six weeks ago, and since then Julie was the owner of the little house that, in her mind, still was her grandmother’s.

 

After preparing some food in the little kitchen and heating up some water for washing, the slayer sat down on the bench on the small wooden terrace. For some time she let her troubled mind wander again, while she observed the dragonflies hunting over the pond in front of the old house. Those insects were delicate creatures, yet fierce hunters. _Not so unlike me_ , Julie mused. At least they had the sense to pick only on prey that was smaller than them. _Unlike me_ , Julie added in her thoughts. Then she returned inside and prepared for bed. The afternoon was getting late and she had to recover before she would go out on her night patrol. The slayer slipped under her sheet and closed her eyes, waiting for sleep, waiting for the nightmares.

 

\---

 

Hours later, after the sun had gone down over Greenfall, Julie combed the area around Frederiksson’s barn, searching for clues to the vampire that had escaped from the encounter in the previous night. Not that she expected that he would confront her again at the same site, but it was as good an activity as any on her patrol. After searching the surroundings of the farm in vain, the slayer pondered where she should proceed with her investigations. She walked out to the country road that went past Frederiksson’s estate. From a small crest Julie overlooked the dark area that extended northwards. Gossamer Forest – a blur of black under the moonlight. Those woods were the densest and most impenetrable in the whole county. In most parts, they remained primeval. Some attempts at logging there had run into various difficulties. Lumberjacks had suffered unexplainable accidents or had even disappeared mysteriously. Every resident of Greenfall and the surrounding towns would assert that Gossamer Forest was haunted, especially when asked about it by gullible tourists. But only Julie knew that it was actually true.

 

Deep inside, the forest harboured some kind of rift, or a spot where the fabric that kept the world apart from other dimensions was weaker than in most other places. Regularly, black magical energy from some demon world spilled over and dispersed into Gossamer Forest. That unpleasant phenomenon attracted all kinds of demonic creatures. They traveled to Greenfall to soak in that energy or have a bath in it, or whatever such bloody creatures would do for a wellness treatment. The dimensional leek had made Julie’s town a goddamn demon holiday resort!

 

Maybe, Julie used to think, that was the reason why a girl from out here in the boondocks would be called to be the slayer. As she could infer from her dreams, however blurred they were, many of her predecessors lived in large centers of population and commerce, where people had lots of opportunities to hunt after happiness and fortune, while demons and vampires had equally good opportunities to hunt after people. Those other girls had had the same hard job as she did, but at least they had pursued it in a more exciting place. In a place where fights over live and death were not the only thrills.

 

Most nights the slayer was wary to enter Gossamer Forest. It meant to seek out her prey directly at the spot where it could draw additional force from the black energy that filled the woods. Usually she was busy enough hunting down those evil creatures who ventured into town and tried to complement their holiday experiences with some taste of local food in the form of one or two townspeople or campers. Due to Julie’s vigilance, most of these endeavours ended lethally for the attackers. Sometimes she wondered, with a grin, if somewhere a demonic travel agency existed, where those who survived those fights could file complaints about spoiled holidays. Was there a regulation as to how much reimbursement a demon tourist would get if he ran into the slayer?

 

This night, Julie decided, she would enter the haunted woods, if only for reconnaissance in the outer parts. The vampire had fled into that direction and maybe the surroundings filled with demonic energy gave him the courage to confront her. Her tactics were somehow risky, and she knew beforehand that Northcutt would scold her again, but she preferred to force a fast resolution over enduring a long, frustrating impasse.

 

With her crossbow raised and ready to shoot, the slayer stepped into the forest. She advanced slowly, both to avoid making noise and falling over the thick underwood. She concentrated on the sound of the night-time wilderness, attentive for any kind of noise that was different from the common repertoire of animal shouts and wind in the trees. For ten or twenty minutes Julie advanced into the ever denser forest. The light of the nearly full moon hardly penetrated the thick crowns of the old trees, and she could not even see her feet anymore. Regretfully she concluded that there was a point in Northcutt’s observation that it was rather useless to try to sneak up on a vampire in a pitch-black surrounding.

 

Ahead, she noticed a small clearing where the moonlight reached the ground. She decided to walk to that spot and consider the further course of action. Once she arrived there, Julie kept silent and stood listening. The only sounds she could hear, apart from the wind above her in the crowns, were some croaks, obviously coming from one of the shallow ponds and swamps that were scattered around the forest. _Rana clamitans melanota_ , Julie remembered. Her cover as an assistant in frog research had compelled her to become something like an expert on amphibians. After all, it would have been difficult to explain if she were not even able to tell one species from the other after two years of alleged studies.

 

Without any sign of a supernatural creature around, she decided to leave the forest. She would find the hiding vampire eventually, but here and now it seemed to be a futile endeavour. Julie turned around – and froze. On the other side of the clearing, still in the shades, but at least dimly lit by the moonlight, somebody was standing and looking into her direction. A moment later, the phantom started to talk.

 

“So are you going back now? I am fine with that”, a female voice said cheerfully, “I just stubbed my toe on a root. It is really easier to follow you on the road.”

 

Julie felt her heart racing, but with the instinct of the slayer she lifted her crossbow and aimed at the figure.

 

“Whoa-ho!” the stranger responded to the gesture. “Be careful with that instrument! Sorry if I frightened you, but if your fingers are shaking, better direct that thing somewhere else, if you would be so nice.”

 

Julie forced herself to stay calm and focused. Her fingers were shaking indeed, but she had no intention to lower her weapon. She kept her eyes fixed at the woman who was now coming closer, in a tentative but confident way. As she stepped out of the shadow, Julie was able to see her better in the moonlight, although her face stayed obscured. She was very tall, towering half a foot or even more over Julie, who was not a short person herself. She seemed to be athletic too, although she appeared rather slender due to her body height. Still her movements were smooth and juvenile. She wore some kind of wide dress, which seemed impractical out in the woods.

 

Was that woman a vampire? Julie doubted that a human could have been following her unnoticed, but then again, even a vampire should not have been that silent. In any case, she could not kill the stranger on mere suspicion, not even out here in this demon-infested Forest.

 

“If you’re not up for being shot, girl, you should not sneak up on me. I tend to become rather short-tempered if someone messes with me”, Julie warned her.

 

“Oh yes, I know that”, the woman answered with the same annoying cheerfulness like before, “I saw how you fought those vampires who tried to outsmart you last night. That was pretty impressive!”

 

Julie could not believe what she had heard. Who was that strange person? Had she really witnessed the confrontation? Why hadn’t Julie noticed her? And if the tall stranger really was a vampire, what had kept her from joining the fight? For some moments back then, the situation had been quite critical for the slayer. A third attacker could have meant Julie’s defeat, she thought with a shudder.

 

“What are you even talking about?” she tried to bluff, but against her will, it sounded more evasive than assertive.

 

“I was there and watched the fight”, the woman explained, “although unfortunately only through a crack in the barn from outside. I could hardly see what was going on, but obviously they had set a trap. I was worried for a moment when you went down, but of course you kept the upper hand in the end. I was sure you would.”

 

“And why would that be?”

 

“Because it takes more than such dimwits to overwhelm a slayer, is it not so?”

 

Julie’s uneasiness deepened. There was this strange woman – or female human-like creature for all she knew – who had obviously – no, admittedly – been following her around and who knew about her nature. What did it all mean?

 

“Look, I’m tired of your beating around the bush”, Julie hissed after a moment of recollecting her composure. “You have been shadowing me, obviously even before tonight, and I want to know at once what you are up to! Remember that there’s still a weapon aimed at your chest!”

 

“I understand”, the stranger said, in a voice that finally was not so jolly anymore. “You have the right to be angered. But I was not really planning to tail you. In fact I wanted to approach you already yesterday, but then the fight broke out and I was intrigued by watching your style. So I was curious to observe your further strategy. That is why I did not contact you earlier. I apologize if that was inappropriate.”

 

“It certainly is inappropriate, even if I wouldn’t feel this rather legitimate urge to pin you onto a tree right now. So you’ve been studying me? To what purpose? I am still not any closer to knowing who you are and what you want from me. Besides, this forest is the worst possible place for sneaking around. It’s…”

 

“…haunted, I know. And you have come here to hunt the vampire that escaped yesterday, am I right?”

 

“Not that it’s any of your business, but yes. Anything else you would like to chat about before you finally come clean?”

 

“Oh, no no! It’s just that you can call off the search. The creature is dust.”

 

“What?”

 

“I followed him yesterday when he ran into the woods. Strong fighter, but inexperienced. It did not take me too long to finish him off.”

 

“You killed him? But how could you…”

 

“Because you and I, we are the same.”

 

Julie opened her eyes in disbelief.

 

“Yes,” the tall woman said, “I am a vampire slayer.”

 

 

 

\--------------------

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

Julie and the other girl sat down on the old bench in front of Greenfall’s town hall. The street was empty, as it usually was in the middle of the night. Apart from occasional barking, nothing could be heard. A street lamp cast its yellow light over the bench and Julie could finally have a good look at the stranger who claimed to be a slayer. She ressembled no person that Julie had ever met before. That was not only because she was Asian, and not many Asian Americans used to travel upstate to some remote area in North Maine. More than that, the young woman’s features caught Julie’s attention. She was not overwhelmingly pretty, but her high cheek bones, elegant nose and ivory complexion gave her face a certain appeal. This, combined with her confident posture and her remarkable body height, made her seem noble, which was further accentuated by her nifty outfit. Her dress, that had appeared impractical in the dark of the forest, was in reality a classy piece of clothing in Asian style, woven in fine garment and seemingly not obstructing her movements in any way. She also wore her hair in a way that reminded Julie of old adventure movies in exotic settings. The black mane was tied up in a knot, held together by two white needles which formed an “X” behind the head. The woman looked completely out-of-place at midnight in a New England town street. Yet her appearance did not fail to impress Julie in a way she could not completely explain to herself.

 

“So let me recap what you told me on the way to town”, Julie started, “you’re telling me that there are in fact hundreds of slayers around the world; and that this fact is being withheld from them? But why would that be?”

 

“That is quite simple” the woman, who had presented herself as Michiko, replied dryly, “it is the Watchers Council which does not want us to know that there are so many of us. They want to control us and use us for their aims, to fight their fights. They tell us that we are alone, so that we feel dependent on their advice and guidance. After all, we are the strongest human beings, but even for a slayer it is sometimes frightening to think that she is standing alone in the world, without anyone really being able to share the burden. Is that not true?”

 

_Of course it is_ , Julie thought. But was it not meant to be like this, cruel as it might be? There was one slayer in every generation, fighting alone and probably dying young for the cause. It was not fair, but it had always been that way. The woman’s deliberations contradicted everything Julie had been taught. Yet that would make sense if her allegations were true and Northcutt had been lying to her all the time. That was not really a notion that would surprise her. But then again, Julie reminded herself, so far she had no reason to believe Michiko any more than him.

 

“Your story is interesting”, she stated, trying to sound less apprehensive than she actually felt, “but why should I believe you? For all that I know, you could still be a vampire that tries to play a dirty trick on me.”

 

The tall girl answered calmly, “But you know that I am not a vampire. You have checked that already when we walked together out of the forest, did you not?”

 

She was right, of course. Julie had kept silent a number of times, listening for breathing sounds from the other woman, and when they had reached the lights she had also verified that the girl’s ribcage was moving up and down.

 

“Well”, Julie replied, “you are breathing all right. But you could be faking it. Even if vampires don’t depend on air in their lungs, that doesn’t mean they are not able to fill them!”

 

“I see, you are really hard to convince. It is good for a slayer to be cautious”, Michiko replied with an approving smile. “But do you think vampires can fake this?” She slowly took Julie’s hand and lifted it towards her bosom. Then she slid it under the neckline of her dress and let it rest over her left breast. Julie was surprised by the intimacy of the act, but understood the invitation to receive the last confirmation that she needed. She concentrated on her tactile impressions and, almost immediately, she felt the beating of Michiko’s heart under her chest. Slayer or not, she was human.

 

Julie noticed that the girl’s skin felt cool, but that did not surprise her at night. In North Maine one could easily get goose bumps at these late hours, even in this unusually warm summer. But goose bumps were obviously not an issue for Michiko. Her pale skin felt soft and smooth, and Julie found that it was pleasurable to touch. She kept feeling for the beat of the woman’s heart, which she could now perceive even clearer than before. And was it even accelerating? After maybe a minute, Julie drew back her hand swiftly. Had she kept it there for a moment too long, she pondered with slight embarrassment. It seemed not to have bothered the Japanese woman who watched her expectantly.

 

“So, are you now persuaded that I am not after sucking you dry?”

 

“Am I…well, yes, you are obviously no vampire. But that does not prove that you are a slayer!”

 

“And yet I am. As I remember every night, when the visions of those who fought before me keep haunting me”, Michiko said with sudden seriousness.

 

“The nightmares…” Julie answered flabbergasted, “You say you are having them too?”

 

“Nearly every night. We all have those dreams. Resurging memories of past slayers. And most recurrently those about one dark-skinned girl, somewhere in a flat, dry land under a burning sun…”

 

“The first slayer!” Julie exclaimed.

 

“Yes. The ancient one. Closer to the demonic forces than all those that came after her. We all have different nightmares about the slayers in every one’s personal line of descent. Yet every slayer in the world dreams of the first.”

 

“So it’s true?” Julie said low-voiced, “There are more of my kind? And my watcher kept that from me all those years?” She covered her face and took a deep breath. She felt her body starting to shake from the emotion, as disappointment and rage took hold of her. But beside those feelings, relief and even hope sneaked in when she felt her fellow slayer lay a comforting arm around her.

 

\---

 

The following nights, Julie and Michiko went patrolling together. Julie felt close to giddy when they walked alongside each other and the Asian girl told her about her childhood in Japan, her fights as a slayer and about how she had learned about the others by coincidence. She had then abandoned her watcher - after beating him up thoroughly - and embarked on her new quest, which was chosen by her and not by the Council. She would roam the world in search for the other slayers, free them from the watchers’ lies, and build up a community where every slayer could find support by her sisters. Julie was fascinated, and what the tall, attractive woman told her, in her pleasant voice and her charming accent, sounded like music to her ears.

 

Michiko had recommended to her not to confront Northcutt with her revelations until they had both decided on the proper course of action. This should also protect the Japanese slayer from being found by the Council, which had been trying to trace her ever since she had stood up against its interests. The need for cover, Michiko explained, was also the reason why she mostly stayed around her rented holiday cabin, close to a small river well outside town. ‘This precaution made me approach you at night when you were patrolling. No wonder you thought that I was a vampire’ the tall girl had said laughingly.

 

Julie kept visiting her watcher for taking her training units and played the obedient girl. Ironically, she even received some approving remarks for probably the first time since she had even met him. ‘That’s how it is with the watchers’ - Michiko commented on this – ‘be docile and neat and they are satisfied. It is all about control.’

 

Since they were patrolling together, the nights around Greenfall were unusually calm. They had only killed a bunch of minor demons, and not one vampire had been in sight. Julie had come to admire the other slayer’s swift handling of her preferred weapon – an old and certainly valuable Japanese sword like those she had once seen in a samurai movie. She had slayed elegantly and effectively, yet they had not really been challenged by their adversaries. Julie wondered if word about two slayers teaming up had spread around the demon community and frightened them away. For the moment, the town seemed to be a fairly safe place. Yet it was to be suspected that this situation was only temporary, which troubled Julie whenever she considered the consequences of a proposal that Michiko had offered her earlier, on another night of joint patrol.

 

“So the other slayers will arrive tomorrow?” Julie asked her tall companion, while they were walking along the path between Gossamer forest and the fishing ponds at the edge of the town.

 

“Yes, probably by evening”, Michiko answered, “the three of them are going to pick me up – well, pick us up, hopefully – on the way down from Canada to New York City. Hiding in the north was fine for the moment, but now it is time we establish ourselves in a place where it will be easier to unite with other stray slayers. I have told the girls on the phone that I succeeded in finding you; and they are looking forward to meeting their newest sister. We all hope that you will join us.”

 

“I would like to come so much!” Julie answered. The vision of moving out of Greenfall, of going to the big city and living there in a community of slayers – a sisterhood, as Michiko called it – appealed to her without limits. Leaving Northcutt and the frogs behind was a liberating thought. She would miss her family and her grandmother’s house, of course, but slaying vampires could not earn her money, so she had few opportunities in this upstate town with limited economic possibilities anyway. Maybe this was the chance of a lifetime for a young woman who used to see her future in fighting demons in the woods until one of them was faster than her.

 

_But am I allowed to be that selfish?_

“Your offer is more than tempting, but I can’t just leave. Even if the Council abuses me and my watcher lies into my face, that does not change the fact that I am needed in this place. That rift down there in the forest drags armies of demons to Greenfall, and they would overrun the town if I was not here anymore to guard it. My family, the townspeople… I have alienated myself from them, but that doesn’t mean I would let them down. I was chosen to defend them. I can’t just leave, as much as I want to…”

 

“Yes, I understand”, Michiko said, with a serious face, “this is very honourable, and nothing less should be expected from a slayer. Yet there may be a possibility, albeit a very dangerous one…”

 

Julie listened attentively. “A possibility? What do you mean?”

 

“There may be”, the Asian woman said hesitantly, “a way, a chance maybe, to…close the rift.”

 

“There is?” Julie was baffled. “How do you know? And why haven’t you told me earlier?”

 

“I apologize, Julie. I should not be keeping things from you like a watcher would do. It is just that I was afraid you would do something rash. And I am not quite certain about this thing either. But I heard stories about a similar rift that once existed in a forest in Japan. If this is the same phenomenon – and it looks very much like it – then it is manipulated by someone – or something. A creature.”

 

“A creature? Tell me more!”

 

“Rifts between dimensions, like the one in Japan, and probably here, open spontaneously from time to time. But Julie, left to themselves, they also close again, after days, maybe months, unless…”

 

“…something keeps them open!” Julie finished the sentence. “But who or what could be doing that?”

 

“In Japan…” Michiko still hesitated, “…it was a mountain demon, an _oni_ , which had found the rift. He maintained and even widened it, with its rather raw, but innate magical abilities. Oni are dim-witted creatures and apply magic rather subconsciously. That demon had fed from the evil energy streaming in through the rift and would not allow it to wither away. Like here, thousands of demons from all over the country were attracted and laid waste on the surrounding villages. It only stopped when the mountain demon was killed and the rift left to close.”

 

Julie was excited. “So you mean that this is what’s going on here? That there is some kind of Japanese demon down in Gossamer, feeding from this rift, and all I have to do is to kill it?”

 

“Not a Japanese demon, I suppose. There are reports about those kinds of creatures from all areas where there are large temperate forests. I think in Europe they call them trolls, and there are also Native American legends describing similar ogres.

 

“But, Julie, it is not so easy to kill them. Those are no average demons we are talking about. They are reported to be huge like elephants and may weigh several tons. And it is said that they can squash a man with one hand.”

 

“Well, I’m not a man.”

 

“Be serious, Julie, please! According to the Japanese legend, it took the men of a dozen villages and a whole squad of fine samurais to defeat the oni, and half of them died in the fight. Even a slayer could not face such a creature alone!”

 

“Maybe not”, Julie answered, “but I am certain that five slayers could. Your girls will arrive tomorrow...”

 

“No, Julie, do not even think about it!” Michiko interrupted “They have been called only recently and have not yet received proper training. One of them had not even been contacted by a watcher, because I was able to detect her first. I will not allow you to draw them into a fight for life or death against such a dangerous adversary!”

 

“I understand”, Julie replied disappointed, “you feel responsible for them and you want to protect them. But that’s how I feel about my family and the people of this town. I have to take up this fight, even if I have to do it alone. You should understand that.”

 

“I do”, Michiko said softly.

 

“Will you join me?” Julie asked her straightforwardly.

 

Michiko sighed, hesitatingly.

 

“I know”, Julie continued, “you don’t want to fight in other people’s battles any more. And you don’t owe me anything and could just walk away. But I ask you for your help. I would love to leave this town with you and the other slayers, but if you are right about the rift, then killing that… troll, or whatever it is, is the only way that I can allow myself to go.”

 

Her new friend looked at her mirthlessly. Finally, after another long sigh, she said with a bitter smile, “Well, if you really insist on confronting a demon that is probably three times your size, I suppose that I really should not miss out on the spectacle. I am coming with you.”

 

Julie felt relieved.

 

“I hope you’ll not just watch the show!” she joked.

 

“And leave you with all the good parts of the story to brag around my naïve young slayers? Forget it!

 

But there is one condition!” Michiko said, in a serious voice once again. “We will have to do it tonight. Once the girls are here, I will not be able to talk them out of fighting with us. They are brave and would not stay behind. We have to look out for the demon before they arrive. And that means this night.”

 

“I’m fine with that”, Julie replied, “I have no reason to wait.”

 

\---

 

The trees seemed to get higher and older the deeper the two slayers advanced into the woods. Julie had never before ventured so far into Gossamer Forest and the unpleasant feeling in her guts augmented with every step she took. She was not too proud to admit to herself that she was anxious about the coming confrontation, but she knew that the sensation in her stomach did not come from fear, but from the evil energy floating around the area. What was so attracting to demons from the whole East Coast felt awkwardly like indigestion to her. Yet, this was also an advantage. By always going into the direction where she felt most uncomfortable, she would inevitably be guided towards the rift and the monster that maintained it. _What a nasty kind of sensor_ , she thought with disgust.

 

The good thing about hunting a troll was that they could light their way with lanterns, which allowed them to proceed quicker as by walking in darkness. As Michiko had explained, the huge creature would simply be too confident to be scared away, even if it saw them coming from afar. And the light would at least balance out the troll’s better night vision.

 

They had marched for about three hours when Julie suddenly heard a low grumbling sound. The same moment Michiko poked into her side and pointed to the left, up a little hill. Julie lowered her lantern, in order not to be dazzled, and concentrated on that spot. After a second she could see what the other girl had indicated – and she felt her heart sink.

 

Michiko had been right. The creature was enormous. Not three times her size though, but closer to four times. And it must weigh at least two tons. The troll walked upright, quite slowly, but agile enough not to snap any trees or large branches. He had obviously seen them too, as he approached them with a cold and maybe slightly curious look, but without any haste.

 

Julie felt her anxiety approaching panic, but she reminded herself to keep calm and concentrate on the necessities of the situation. She knew that she would feel more confident once the fight had started, when she would be focussed on the combat. So she tried to limit her thoughts to the plan that Michiko and she had prepared.

 

The girls walked slowly sideways to an area where a large tree had fallen down. This had created a small clearing that would allow them to manoeuvre. The trunk of the broken tree also served as a good spot to place Julie’s lantern, while Michiko hung hers upon a branch some ten yards away. That way the clearing was illuminated from two sides. _A goddamn arena for a death match_ , Julie thought. _At least we got to choose the battleground_ , she added to herself when she saw that the monster still came closer, unimpressed by the stage they had arranged in the middle of the wood.

 

Julie positioned herself at the center of the clearing, right between the lamps. She started to wave her hands and to shout insults at the troll. The creature seemed slightly confused by the spectacle, but appeared not at all worried. It just emitted annoyed snorts and fixed the young woman with creepy, cold eyes. Once again Julie had to remind herself not to lose control. Silently she hoped that the fight would start sooner rather than later, so she would not succumb to her urge to run away after all. That beast was huge indeed!

 

Had it noticed how Michiko had sneaked away into the dark in order to move behind it? It seemed as if Julie’s show had distracted it enough to temporarily forget about the other small creature that had been so crazy to enter its domain. Or maybe it just didn’t care about her, harmless as she must seem, and concentrated on the blond girl jumping up and down before it. Either way, so far their plan seemed to be working. Now all that Julie had to do was to maintain the troll’s attention until Michiko could start the first attack.

 

The beast had now reached the clearing and towered before the slayer, its monstrosity even accentuated by the illumination from below. It grunted with a low voice and Julie felt the soil under her feet vibrating. Then, with the unchanged cold, detached look on its face, it reached down for her. Michiko’s warning that the creature could squash a man with its hands flashed through her mind. Not wanting to test its validity, Julie jumped out of the way and rolled around. The troll’s hand grasped at nothing and it snorted angrily. The slayer observed that it was moving slower than her. That meant that the girls had at least one advantage over the monster. She escaped again as the troll tried to catch her with its other hand. It seemed to be getting unnerved and at the third attempt, instead of grasping for her, it tried to punch her. The giant fist banged onto the broken tree only inches away from Julie’s body. _What is keeping Michiko_ , she thought as she braced herself for evading the next blow.

 

Then she saw the slim shadow of the Japanese slayer gliding down from a tree, her slender sword in both hands. She jumped directly at the troll’s neck, ramming the blade deep inside with the impact. The giant creature emitted an agonizing cry and reached around for the attacker, but he was not able to get a grip on the girl. Michiko hung from its back, with one hand on the hilt of her sword and the other one holding on to the creature’s bushy fur. While the stroke had been well set, it had not taken the troll down, but infuriated it instead. Julie saw how her friend struggled to pull out her weapon, so that she could strike again, but the wild movements of her enemy did not give her the opportunity. Instead, she had to strive constantly for not losing her grip. Suddenly the troll moved backwards to the closest tree and started to rub its back against the branches. Horrified, Julie saw a large bough hitting the girl over the head, which made her finally lose hold and fall down from the beast’s back. For a short moment the Asian slayer lay on the ground and Julie expected the troll to trample her at the next moment. But Michiko came quickly to her feet and tried to escape its infuriated stomping. Indeed she managed not to get scrunched by the tree-like feet, but a kick from the side hit her with full power and sent her flying away. Julie saw her crashing against a tree and falling down like a lifeless doll.

 

The troll snorted rabidly and walked towards the motionless girl. Julie knew that she could not afford to lose a second if she wanted to safe Michiko’s life. She ran towards the beast, and gathering all her forces, she jumped at its back. Even with her abilities as a slayer she could just jump as high as its shoulder blades, but somehow she managed to reach the hilt of the Japanese sword that was still stuck deep inside the creature’s back. It let out another pained cry that nearly split her ears. Its short moment of shock gave her time to get a grip on its fur. Like Michiko before, she tried to pull out the sword with one hand, while holding on to the thick, felted hair with the other. But she did not do any better; the angle was just not good enough to get any leverage. And then, like with the other slayer before, the creature attempted to shake her off by rubbing its back against the trees. Brushes were hitting Julie’s face and stomach and she wondered how long she would be able to hold on. Then she noticed a thick bough protruding sideways from a large tree at about the height of her hips. Another, thinner one extended right above it, at the height of her head. Releasing the hilt, she grasped for the upper branch when the troll moved backwards towards the trunk; and letting go of the fur as well, she managed to swing towards the thick bough and wrap her leg around it. With some effort, she managed to climb on the bough and get upright. The troll, not feeling her weight at its back any more, angrily trampled the floor below its feet, where it doubtlessly expected her to be. It was still just an arm's length away from her and she saw the unexpected opportunity to get hold of the sword after all. She reached out for the hilt, while firmly embracing the trunk of the tree. With the troll jumping around furiously, her attempts were in vain, but eventually it noticed that it was only trampling the bare ground and kept immobile to watch around for its enemy. At that moment she could finally close her hand around the hilt and the creature’s alarmed step forward did the rest. Julie held the sword in her hand. She was armed, but also detected.

 

The gigantic troll moved around and faced her with murderous fury in its eyes. It growled and showed its teeth that seemed nearly as long as the sword she held in her hand as her only defence. Then it raised its fist and prepared to lash out, ready to smash her against the trunk. Julie considered jumping off the tree as the only way to escape the blow, but that would put her right in front of its enormous legs. Just as her mind raced as to how she could avoid being either smashed or trampled to death, she heard a whooshing sound and saw an arrow digging into the troll’s ear. Her heart jumped. Michiko was alive and coming to her help. The creature broke off the imminent strike and covered its ear, yelling as another arrow pierced its hand. It stepped forward, thereby getting closer to Julie. She knew instantly that this was the moment she had to seize. She let herself fall forward, the sword in both hands, aiming straight for the troll’s throat. She pushed the blade into the creature’s flesh. It felt as hard as wood, but with her full weight and all her force, supporting herself with her feet on the bough, she managed to drive the sword in almost to the hilt. Blood spilt all over her, while the troll emitted a suffocating rattle. It staggered backwards, which made her feet lose contact. Half she jumped, half she fell to the floor. She rolled around and looked up to the giant beast that struggled in vain to stay on its feet and would go down every moment now. Julie saw that she had only a slim chance to get away in time and she could only hope that the wounded creature would not fall over her, crushing her after all. She had just come halfway to her feet when it hit the ground at two arm's lengths from where she was. It took down two smaller trees with it, one of them knocking Julie down again with its branchwood.

 

Panting heavily, she disentangled herself form the branches and looked at the troll. It was still alive, but its movements were feeble and undirected. The next moment, Michiko came running out of the dark, with Julie’s crossbow in her hand. She threw it away and jumped on the troll’s chest. Then the Asian slayer grabbed her sword, drew it out and, with a triumphant cry, she pushed it back into the creature's throat. That she repeated four or five times, until every movement of the giant ogre had died down. The troll’s blood covered her from head to toe, when she turned to Julie and looked at her with a rapacious grin on her face.

 

\---

 

The victorious slayers covered the distance back from the heart of the forest remarkably faster than on their way in. Michiko was nearly running, clearly full of enthusiasm about the successful hunt. Julie found that this had a contagious effect on her; she too felt her adrenaline rush through her body much more than it did after some dull, routine fight against any old vampire.

 

“You really enjoyed dealing it the final blow, didn’t you”, she teased the dark-haired woman.

 

Michiko smiled.

 

“You have to admit, Julie, that it was a great hunt. And you were just terrific! I have never seen a slayer so courageous and skillful.”

 

The other slayer’s exuberant praise made Julie feel slightly embarrassed. Was she even blushing? Why did this girl’s approval mean so much to her? Was it just because she had never received any encouragement for her achievements as a slayer? So far, the only person to watch her in action had been Northcutt, and not for all the tea in China would he ever say something remotely appreciative. Yet she knew inside that this was not the actual reason for her agitation; that the praise wouldn’t have excited her so much if it had come from any other person.

 

“You and I, we will be able to teach the younger slayers so much”, Michiko said to her. “We can start something really extraordinary, the two of us together! You will keep to your word and come with us, will you not?”

 

“Yes, of course I will!” Julie’s head swirled at the thought of her whole existence changing totally within a short time, but she had no doubts that she wanted the new life that Michiko had envisioned.

 

“I knew this would be your decision”, the tall Asian said with a subtle smile and a keen gaze that, very much to Julie’s chagrin, made her look away bashfully.

 

_How can it be that sometimes I feel more nervous around her than when I faced the giant troll?_

The answer to this question slowly dawned on her, and it scared her much less than she would probably have imagined just a week earlier.

 

Meanwhile they had reached the outer parts of Gossamer Forest and came to cross a swampy area where a number of small ponds were located. The joyful croaking of _rana clamitans melanota_ welcomed the involuntary frog expert and her tall companion. Julie saw the mirror image of the bright moon dancing above the surface of the closest pond.

 

Michiko stopped and looked over the water for some seconds. Then she turned to Julie.

 

“I am drenched in troll blood and goo and I stink of dead demon. I want a bath. Will you join me?”

 

Julie was baffled. “You want to go swimming? In the middle of the night in Gossamer Forest?”

 

“Why not?” the Japanese slayer said in an amused tone. “Do you think that anything more frightening than what we just killed will come along and steal our clothes? Julie, I know that this is still a haunted place, and I will not swim too far away from my sword, but I could really use a bit of cleaning up. And you, my dear, if you allow me to be so blunt, do not smell of roses either!”

 

She was, of course, right. Julie ran her fingers through her sticky hair. She had virtually been showered with stinking liquid when she had rammed Michiko’s sword into the monster’s throat. Of a sudden, she felt embarrassed about the other girl seeing her like that. But the thought of getting naked in front of her made her feel uneasy too. Michiko, on the other hand, did not seem to harbour similar inhibitions. Julie found out about another quality of her new friend’s elegant Asian attire, when she saw her opening it with a single swift movement of the hand at her shoulder. Silently the dress slid to the ground and uncovered the young woman's slender body. The white moonlight accentuated her pale skin and let shadows play around her small, round breasts and her belly with every movement she made. When she reached behind the head and pulled out the white needles, her pitch black hair fell down below her shoulders. Julie could not help but stare at the appealing woman. Michiko caught her look. She answered it with a teasing smile that made the blonde slayer’s heart accelerate, and then she dove into the pond.

 

Julie watched her indulging herself in the water, cleaning her body and hair with graceful movements. Then the Asian girl paused and looked back at her through the wet streaks that had fallen over her face.

 

“Julie, dear, you are not coming? It is wonderful in here!”

 

Julie twitched. _How long have I been standing here, watching her like a goof ?_

She found a shrub to cover herself and unbuttoned her pants. While she slipped them off, she heard joyful laughter coming from Michiko.

 

“Are you having fun there in the underwood? Gee, you prudish Americans are so amusing!”

 

The mockery annoyed Julie. She stepped out from behind the shrub and undressed further. She took off her shirt, the bra and finally the panties, disconcertingly aware of the moonlight shining on her body and of the dark-haired girl’s eyes upon her.

 

Hurriedly, she walked into the water and dove under the surface. The pond was cool, but not unpleasantly so. Julie enjoyed the soothing feeling of the water and started to scrub the troll’s repulsive fluids from her skin. She was washing her face, when she felt Michiko’s hand tenderly touching her hair.

 

“Let me help you with that!” she heard her say softly, while she felt the girl’s hands wiping the sticky goo out of her strands. “We shall not allow this stinking stuff to mar your beautiful blond hair any longer! How pretty it looks under the white moonshine!”

 

Julie closed her eyes and relished the attentions and the compliments. After some time she felt Michiko’s hand move to her back and rub it gently, which she found even more pleasurable. Then, all of a sudden, there was a tender touch of soft lips on her neck, and frisson of excitement ran through her body. She turned around to find the other girl’s eyes. Their expression removed Julie’s doubts. The two women's lips closed in a passionate kiss.

 

Michiko slung her arms around Julie and she responded eagerly, pressing their bodies together. It seemed to Julie that she felt the other woman’s heartbeat just as strong as her own. While they exchanged more kisses, their hands caressed each other’s bodies; and Julie felt nothing more than the cool water and the warm skin of that enchanting person who had come out of nowhere to change her life for the better in so many ways. Even the noise of the frogs disappeared from her mind.

 

A while later, Julie lay on the soft grass at the edge of the pond. She was not even sure who had pushed whom out of the water and onto the moist floor. She looked up at Michiko who was hunched over her and whose long black hair touched her face smoothly. The Asian girl’s face was obscured by the night, but Julie made out a lustful sparkle in her eyes.

 

“You know you are mine now, beautiful slayer!” she said hoarsely and bent down to kiss Julie again, who could only groan her approval. Her body trembled while the other woman explored her with tender hands; and when they finally reached her most intimate parts, she bit her lips in helpless arousal. Julie slung her legs around her lover, pressed herself against the smooth skin of Michiko's tall body. Her breath accelerated and not much later she felt the world around her disappear.

 

 

\--------------------


	3. Chapter 3

Warm sunlight caressed Julie’s skin as she slowly woke up from a deep and relaxing sleep. She remembered pleasant dreams - dreams, not nightmares, for the first time since what seemed to be ages. Opening her eyes, she looked into the light blue sky of another warm summer day. Closing them again, she listened to the singing of birds that had replaced the nightly concert of the frogs. She felt the coolness of the meadow under her naked body and the moistness of the dew around her. These feelings contrasted in the most pleasant way with the warmth she felt inside. It was as if she was glowing from last night’s delightful experiences. She replayed them in her head and the recollections overwhelmed her. Julie giggled out of bliss.

 

Her hand reached out for the body of her lover whom she expected at her side – and touched only grass. Confused, Julie opened her eyes again and sat up. She was alone. The unaffectedly cheerful birds were her only company. Slightly alarmed, Julie got up. She called the other girl, but received no reply. She told herself not to worry. Surely Michiko had had a perfectly sound reason to leave while her friend was still sleeping. Yet, despite those reassurances, the well-known feeling of loneliness slowly came creeping in again.

 

She went to gather her clothes, when she noticed a longish, black object lying in the grass, close to where she had left her pants the night before. Approaching, she recognized Michiko’s sword, which she had used to kill the monstrous troll, in its ebony sheath. The sight made her worry even more strongly than before. Why on earth would Michiko leave her valuable weapon behind? Had she been taken away against her will?

 

A small piece of paper was attached to the sword’s hilt and Julie squatted down to take it off. It read:

 

_Julie, my dear, you will be so kind as to bring me back my weapon when we meet tomorrow evening at my cabin, will you not?_

Julie smiled with relief. Not only was Michiko unharmed, she also still wanted her to go with her. And she had even played this little prank with the sword on her, in order to be certain that Julie would not back off.

 

_Don’t worry, sweetheart,_ Julie thought, _I’ve made up my mind. You won’t get rid of me that easily any more._

Gleefully, Julie put on her clothes, hardly minding their stench of dead troll.

 

_Should have washed them last night and let them dry in the morning sun. Wonder why I didn’t think about that. Must have been distracted,_ she told herself with a broad grin on her face.

 

Finally she grabbed her bag and looked inside. All her weapons were there. She slightly frowned on Michiko’s carelessness to walk away totally unarmed. She had still been inside Gossamer Forest after all, and that was not a place to stroll around at night without defence, even for a slayer.

 

_Well, maybe even less a place to sleep naked on the floor…_ she reckoned. _Girl, you really make me lose my senses…_

Humming a jolly little tune, Julie headed back to town.

 

\---

 

The sun was already standing low when Julie walked towards Michiko’s cabin later that day. She had not needed long to pack a travel bag, as she had never been the kind of person to be too attached to objects and had not felt like taking to many memories with her. She hadn’t taken many clothes either, as her small town girl attire would not fit into the big city anyway. She did not forget her crossbow and her favourite stake though – she would now start a new life of her choosing, but it was still the life of a slayer.

 

Bidding farewell to her parents and her brother had been harder. Julie was not totally convinced that they had bought her story about the invitation from a college in Portland she had applied to months earlier. Although she was not exactly extroverted, it was hardly believable that she wouldn’t have mentioned that, after it had been her parents themselves who had suggested to her filing college applications. “Even if you are so fond of your frogs”, they had told her, “it is more reasonable to leave them for a while. You can become a renowned biologist and then return here and design your own experiments!” She had found it increasingly difficult to find a good excuse as to why she could not leave Greenfall, while deep within she wanted nothing more than just that. But even if they had doubts about her sudden change of mind, they had kept silent about them. Maybe, she thought, because they considered her finally moving in the right direction. Or, more probably, because they just knew their headstrong daughter well enough to know that she could not be talked out of a project she had embarked on.

 

Julie decided that later, maybe within a couple of months, she would return for a visit. Then she would tell them a cover story that was more in line with the life she would have at that time. But that had to wait until she herself knew more about what that new life would be like. She only knew two things for sure: first, it would have in it the most fascinating and admirable person she had ever met; and second, it would definitely not include frogs.

 

After a two hours walk, Julie reached Michiko’s cabin. She had not been in that area for a while, but having grown up in her small town and its surroundings, she knew the old hut quite well. When she was little, it was still the residence of an old, grumpy logger who used to scold her, her brother and Anne when they played Cowboys and Indians around his house. The place had been conveniently situated, close to a picturesque small rock slope that had transformed to Monument Valley and a small river that had become the mighty Mississippi in their childish minds. But after the old man’s death, his nephew had transformed it into a holiday cabin that he rented out to summer vacationists from Portland or Boston – and this year to a certain young woman from Japan.

 

Julie found another slip of paper on the cabin’s door.

 

_Dear Julie! I went to meet the girls at the interstate to guide them here. We may also have dinner on the way. Please make yourself comfortable! I will be with you in short time, my love!_

The door was unlocked. Julie entered the cabin and put down her bag. She took out Michiko’s sword and placed it gently on the cabin’s big wooden table. Then she looked around her, but found the place somehow empty. She could not see a lot of things that she assumed to be her friend’s personal stuff. Obviously the Japanese slayer preferred to travel light, too.

 

Julie went back out and sat down on the wide wooden balcony. She listened to the quiet murmuring of the river and felt the last beams of the evening sun on her face, before it slowly went dark. She kept waiting for another hour or two, expectantly at first, but increasingly anxious with the passage of time. Finally she saw the headlights of two cars coming up the dirt road that led to the cabin. The vehicles parked between some trees, a little bit down the road from Julie’s position. Shortly afterwards she saw Michiko’s tall stature, as she and three other women walked closer. The Asian girl approached her and they hugged gently. Julie felt another rush of hormones running up her spine, as she remembered how good it was to be with her lover.

 

After welcoming her, Michiko introduced the other slayers to Julie. The three girls were young, probably even younger than Julie herself, or at least not much older. The first one, whom Michiko introduced as Elisabeth, was a pretty, slightly chubby blonde who greeted her with a distinctive Southern accent. The second, Juana, was a slim Hispanic beauty with long hair as dark as Michiko’s and captivating brown eyes. Both girls gave Julie a friendly smile, which she returned in the same way.

 

“And this is Monique, my special protégée”, said Michiko, as she presented the third girl. Julie turned towards the young slayer, still with a warm smile on her face, but she was suddenly taken aback by the expression in that girl's eyes. Monique, delicately built, with a handsome face, short dark hair and dressed all in black, glared at her with what seemed to be a mixture of anger and apprehension. Then she too started to smile, but with a vicious expression rather than a well-meaning one. All of a sudden, the girl came close, slung her arms around her and pressed her lips on her own. Totally taken by surprise, Julie did not know how to react to the assault. The girl’s kiss was voracious and aggressive, without affection or tenderness. She pressed her body against Julie’s, and the way she sealed her mouth with her lips and even stuck her tongue into her mouth hardly allowed Julie to catch her breath.

 

_Breath!!!_

In an instant Julie’s mind cleared, as her slayer instincts set in. The girl had not breathed since she had pressed her mouth on hers, nor had Julie sensed her heartbeat since she had hugged her. She shoved her hands between her body and the girl’s and pushed Monique away. The girl stumbled backwards a few yards and grinned at her through a ghastly vampire face.

 

“Michiko, she’s a vampire!” Julie shouted, while she saw how Elisabeth and Juana, who had so far watched the events with confusion, equally changed their faces and unveiled their fangs. Julie hastily reflected upon the situation. Her weapons were all inside the cabin, and so was Michiko’s sword. Still, two slayers should be capable of taking on three vampire girls, or at least of holding them in check until they could improvise something pointy to terminate them. But before Julie could start to act, she felt an excruciating stitch in her neck. Pain flooded through her body like an electric current. _I must not faint_ , was the thought that crossed her brain, but her resolution was in vein. Blackness surrounded her.

 

\---

 

_Pain! Such terrible pain!_

Julie returned from unconsciousness and felt burning wounds spread over her body. She opened her eyes, but they looked into darkness. She felt exhausted and weak, and only her fear and confusion kept her from passing out again immediately.

 

She realized that there was not only the stinging pain on many parts of her body, but that there were also hands touching her. She was not alone in the blackness. Julie attempted to get up and away, but found that she could not move her arms and legs. To her horror, she sensed that her wrists and ankles were cast in iron. Someone had chained her down to the floor in some cold and dark place. Her heart raced and panic took hold of her. Close to the centres of the pain, numerous hands held her limbs tight. Slowly her eyes adapted to the darkness and she found the strength to lift her head. Had she already been horrified a moment earlier, what Julie now saw made the blood in her veins freeze. Even with all the sangfroid of a slayer, she could not help but emit a scream of sheer terror.

 

She lay indeed chained on the floor, spread-eagled and completely naked; and over her defenceless body huddled five vampires who fed from her arm, belly and thighs. Her warm blood dropped from five bloody wounds upon which the creatures sucked with relish. Julie struggled helplessly to escape, but she could hardly move a few inches. Her attempts only served to make her tormentors chuckle maliciously. She fought for a minute in vain, until she fell back in exhaustion. She forced herself to control her panic and searched frantically for a way to get out of her desperate situation, but could not find any.

 

_So this is the end, then? What a horror! Not like that!_

She tried mightily to calm herself down. Maybe there was no way out of this, but if there was any minuscule chance to survive, she had to maintain a clear mind.

 

_If only I didn’t feel so weak…_

One of the vampires, who drank from her left arm, looked up and smiled viciously. Julie recognized Elisabeth, the blonde from the South.

 

“I think our pretty guest is awake now!” she said over her shoulder. Julie tried to see to whom she was talking. The other vampires looked up shortly, and their remorseless, predatory glances met her eyes, sending her back to the edge of mindless panic. She recognized Juana, the Hispanic girl, whose chin was dripping with blood from Julie’s belly. The other two vampires feeding from her were male. And then there was Monique. The petite girl had sunk her fangs into Julie’s sensitive inner thighs, very close to her intimate parts, and that bite was the deepest and most painful of them all. Also her gaze was different from the others’. They all looked at her with merciless pleasure, regarding her more as a prey and a toy than a person. But in Monique’s eyes there was something very different – hatred, very specific, profound hatred. In a terribly absurd and cruel way Julie found that nearly comforting. At least that girl showed some emotion towards her, and didn’t just see food in the helpless slayer.

 

A voice sounded from the back of the room. “I know she is awake, Elisabeth. We all heard her screaming. Now stand back and hurt her no more!” Julie could not fail to recognize immediately the voice of the woman she loved. She stared uncomprehendingly at Michiko’s familiar face while the tall girl came out of the dark and knelt down at Julie’s feet, smiling at her sympathetically.

 

Had she come to her rescue? But why did the vampires not attack her, but rather seemed to take orders? In fact they retracted unwillingly, but without hesitation, from Julie’s body, with the sole exception of Monique, who seemed particularly reluctant to pull her fangs out of Julie’s flesh. Eventually she did so, apparently in the most painful way she could perform, which made Julie whimper. Michiko gave Monique a reprimanding look. The young girl averted her eyes.

 

Julie was confused, as hope and dismay struggled within her. Was it denial to expect rescue from her friend who seemed to be in close relationship with her tormentors? But had she not told them to stop hurting her and frowned on Monique’s atrocity? Was she playing some kind of trick on the vampires to set her free?

 

“Michiko…”, she started.

 

“Hush!” the tall slayer said soothingly. “Don’t talk! You have lost a lot of blood. Just try to relax and calm down!”

 

She grabbed Julie´s big toes.

 

“Will you please try to move your toes? I have to be sure that you are not paralyzed.”

 

Julie wiggled her toes and felt them move between Michiko’s fingers. The Japanese girl looked relieved.

 

“That is good! You seem to be alright so far. I had not performed this narcotic stab in a long time, and I was really worried that I could have pinched a nerve.”

 

Julie was shocked. She felt how the hope she had put in Michiko’s appearance faded. Instead, the horrifying feeling of betrayal crept in.

 

“That terrible sting? You did this do me? You injected me with something? And why, Michiko? Why do you turn me over to our enemies?” Julie asked the woman she had trusted and loved. Tears welled in her eyes.

 

“Shush! I told you to stay calm! There is really no need to be agitated. You will understand very soon, my love!”

 

Michiko came closer and sat down at Julie’s side. She started to caress the helpless girl’s aching and bleeding body, gently and soothingly.

 

“First”, she explained, ”I did not drug you. I pricked you with this.” Michiko presented one of her hair needles. She pulled off a tiny lid and uncovered a thin steel thorn at the top of the white wooden instrument. “It is an old, nearly forgotten art to stun someone with a carefully applied sting into a very specific point at the back of that person’s neck. I could very likely be the last one to master it. It is also very practical, as hair needles are seldom suspected of being a weapon. But forgive me, Julie, I am sure you are not so interested in hearing me brag about my ninja skills.”

 

“Tell me what’s going on, for heaven’s sake!” Julie shouted, tearing desperately at the chains which held her down. “Why are you betraying me and gang up on me with those vampires?”

 

Michiko stroked her captive’s hair.

 

“Julie dear, I side with them because they are my kin!”

 

“But… that’s not possible!” Julie stumbled incredulously. “You can’t be one of them! I felt your heart beat. It is not possible for a vampire…”

 

“…to fake a beating heart?” Michiko finished the sentence. “Well, in general you are right. It takes little practice to pretend breathing, but moving one’s heart muscle is usually beyond a vampire’s control as much as beyond a human’s. And admittedly, self-control is not the most characteristic quality of many vampires!” She cast a mocking look on Monique who squirmed at her ridicule. Not minding the girl’s reaction, Michiko continued. “But indeed, it is possibly to reach that level of mastery of one’s body. I had been trained in the ancient teachings and rituals of _Zen_ since I was a little child and was already advanced in them when I was sired. Since then I had more than a century and a half to improve my skills. That is definitely one of the advantages of being immortal – one has a lot of time to excel in many arts. But it sure is not easy to fake a beating heart, and it needs a lot of concentration. I admit that I forgot about it a couple of times while we were making love in the forest. Fortunately, you were too far gone at those moments to notice.”

 

She chuckled. Behind her, Julie saw Monique cringe like in pain. There was no doubt any more as to the reason of the petite vampire’s hatred towards her. Jealousy was written all over her face.

 

Julie closed her eyes. She had run into a vampire’s trap again, for the second time within a week; only that this trap had been much more sophisticated and cruel than the former one. And most probably there was no hope of escaping her fate this time. So the day that had started as the happiest of her life was meant to be her last? She closed her eyes and sighed.

 

“So it was all lies!” she said in a resigned tone, more to herself than to Michiko. “And I bought all that crap about you being a slayer.”

 

“No, Julie”, Michiko answered calmly, “it was not all lies. I have deceived you, that is true, but I did not make it all up. You see, I AM a slayer!”

 

Julie stared at her with widened eyes.

 

“I was called a long time ago, in what would be the year 1799 in your calendar. Maybe you have heard of me. My real name is Yuki. Yuki Makimura. Does it ring a bell?”

 

It didn’t.

 

“I am not surprised”, she continued. “This is very typical for the Watchers Council to sweep his defeats under the carpet. And my ascension to vampire was for sure one of their biggest defeats. I suppose some zealots erased me from all their official records.”

 

Julie shook her head. “That can’t be true. If you had been a slayer before me, I would have had nightmares springing from your memories, like from all the other former slayers. I would have remembered you!”

 

The vampire looked intrigued. “Yes, you are right! I wondered about that, too! I would be very surprised if the Council was able to manipulate the memories from the slayer line. Maybe you do not have access to my memories because I am not dead – I mean truly dead, but undead instead. It is fascinating, but I am not an expert on the supernatural, so I cannot be sure about the reason. But in any case, it helped me to play my little prank on you.”

 

“Little prank?” Julie exclaimed angrily. “You put my whole life upside down, made me doubt everything I had learned!”

 

“And it did not take a lot to do that, or did it?” the vampire said sneeringly.

 

“You pretended you cared…”

 

“And I do!” Michiko – no, Yuki – said softly again, stroking Julie’s body once more. “I confess that I had sinister plans when I arrived here. It was the same night when we first met in the forest. Before approaching you, I had come upon an inexperienced young vampire who told me about a fight in a barn the night before. It was a bit of information that was of good use in order to gain your trust faster. Oh, I suppose you did recognize my latest follower?” She pointed to one of the male vampires, whom Julie now identified as the enemy who had struck her down with a piece of steel some days ago. He showed Julie his fangs with a threatening growl; then he grinned smugly. Yuki rolled her eyes. “Guys!” she said wryly “Boasting does not stop only because they die.

 

“Anyway, my original plan was only to deceive you long enough to recruit you for the fight against the troll. I owed it to some demons to kill it; and incidentally the slayer lived in the same area – or probably not so incidentally, but who knows about who chooses the slayers and with which intentions? So I thought it was a great idea to lure you into joining me in combat, instead of putting my fledglings into danger. Speaking of my girls, are they not cute? I sired them all myself! So I have to thank you. You were most remarkable in the troll fight and a great help! Unfortunately I must tell you that the creature was in fact one of the good guys, but you will understand that I could not let you in on that earlier. But do not be too frustrated about it! Very soon, this ‘good versus evil’- thing will have no meaning for you anymore.”

 

“So you’re gonna kill me now” Julie tried to state as calmly as she could, but she heard her voice break.

 

_I always knew I would not get old. That is the slayer’s fate. But I expected it to happen in a fight, that I’d die standing and hopefully quick. But not like this, naked, chained and weak. Oh no, please, no!_

Yuki leaned forward and kissed her trembling captive. Julie turned her head away in disgust. The vampire did not act offended. Her voice remained calm and soothing.

 

“No Julie! Not that way! I wanted to kill you before I met you, but then we were fighting side by side, and I became infatuated with your style and bravery. And after we spent the night together, I knew that it would be unforgiveable to kill you. So instead, I decided to offer you a gift!”

 

Julie looked at her in horror. She understood instantly what Yuki planned to do.

 

“No!” she shouted at her. “Don’t even think about turning me into a soulless creature like you are! Kill me here and now, if you must, but I’ll never let you transform me into such a thing! What you allowed to happen to you is the worst thing a slayer can ever do. No real slayer would ever…”

 

“Would ever what?” Yuki interrupted, for the first time with some anger in her voice, “Would ever cut the leash of the Council, claiming her life as her own? Would ever tell chicken-hearted creatures who fear her power, and therefore bind her and hold her back and give her orders, that they are not worthy to walk on the same soil like her? And what does a ‘real slayer’, as you say so haughtily, gain by submitting to the Council’s rules? How long has the longest tenure of one slayer lasted? Six years? Seven years? Was there ever a slayer to celebrate her 25th birthday? I am over 180 years old! And I do never have to go into battles that inferiors send me to. If I had followed the rules others have forced upon us, I would not be more than a memory in that pretty head of yours. I would have died in 1801, in a fight against the Master, a vampire so old and powerful that I could not expect to defeat him. But instead of ending me, he showed me a way to continue. And not just to continue, but to ascend, to become more than I had been before. And even more than the common vampire.

 

“Julie, do you not see it? Like you stand far above the average human, thanks to your abilities and instincts, I am more than just a normal vampire! Look at my followers here – they honor my supremacy.”

 

Julie saw Elisabeth nod respectfully. Monique looked at the tall Japanese amorously. Yuki’s other henchmen showed no sign of objection either. To Julie’s bitter disappointment, she understood that there was no hope that Yuki’s swagger would cause disunity among her minions.

 

“The powers of a slayer and of a vampire united in one person!” she continued her pretentious speech, “I am unique, a vampire sublime! And so will be you! Rejoice, my love! For I have decided to share my gloriousness with you!”

 

Yuki’s face changed to the frightful grimace of the vampire and she displayed her long fangs. Julie froze, from the horrifying sight of her former lover’s true appearance as well as from the expectation of the imminent pain and death. But it was not Julie’s neck that Yuki’s fangs were aiming at. The vampire brought her own hand to her mouth and bit her wrist. She closed her eyes for an instant, but did not let out as much as a whimper. Blood started to drip from her lower arm. Then she guided it cautiously towards Julie’s mouth. “Drink now, little slayer, and be liberated!”

 

Julie pressed her lips together. Drops of vampire blood fell on them, but she kept her mouth firmly shut.

 

“Do not fight it, Julie! I promise, once you have drunk from my blood, I will kill you as quick and painlessly as I possibly can, and within a few hours you will rise and be my equal. Can you not see what we will be? Vampire nobility! Remember what I told you about the sisterhood of slayers? It was just a story I made up, but we can make it real! Imagine, we can turn every slayer that comes after you. We will found a new race and you and I will be their leaders.”

 

Yuki spoke ever more quickly and her voice turned husky. “We will rule together; and vampires and humans alike will bow before us and lie at our feet. Can’t you see it? It will be magnificent! Ooh!“ She moaned sensually.

 

Julie remembered that vampires got excited by siring a victim. She turned her head away. The night before, she had been aroused beyond her senses by the other girl’s lust. Now it only disgusted her.

 

Yuki seemed to get frustrated. “ _Chikucho, baka na yagi!_ Now open your mouth and drink my blood, you stubborn girl! Why are you still resisting?”

 

“We could force her mouth open!” Elisabeth suggested eagerly.

 

Yuki snorted. “Force-feeding my noble blood? Are you proposing I should degrade myself?”

 

“Of course not, Yuki-san! I apologize”, the chubby vampire said submissively.

 

Yuki got on her feet. Julie looked up and saw the tall vampire’s face high above her, human-like again, but with a disgruntled expression that held little promise for the slayer’s fate.

 

“So you prefer to be the Council’s good slayer puppy then?” Yuki said angrily. “And I suppose that now you expect me to change my mind about siring you and grant you a martyr’s death, so you can take up your place in the quickly-forgotten-slayers’ hall of no-fame? Sorry, my dear, but such an easy way out is not in the cards for you. I had wished that I could convince you the easy way, with my words; I really did. But since you are so stubborn, I will have to coerce you to embrace your destiny.”

 

She looked down at Julie with sudden coldness.

 

“You will find out that among my skills there is also the knowledge on how to inflict pain without permanently hurting or killing somebody. Don’t fool yourself; I can keep you alive down here for weeks or months or even years; naked, frightened and suffering. I am in no hurry; but you will understand eventually that there is no way out but through my blood, and you will beg for it. And when you beg, you shall receive it.”

 

Julie struggled not to show how terrified she was at Yuki’s words, but she sensed that the vampire was very adept at reading expressions of fear. Yuki continued in a warmer tone:

 

“I will not enjoy torturing you – or, well, maybe I will, because I usually do like a nice little torture – but in any case, it will be up to you to stop it immediately. Just open your mouth and take in my blood! And once you are like me, you will understand and also forgive me about the rude means I had to apply in order to persuade you.

 

But for now, we will leave you alone to rest for the day. You may think about your options – which are effectively reduced to one – and if you are wise, you will spare yourself further agonies and drink from me when I return.”

 

She winked at the other vampires and they started to climb up a ladder that obviously led to another room above Julie’s prison. One by one they disappeared through a hatch in the ceiling. Yuki followed last and then the hatch was closed, leaving Julie in total darkness.

 

Hours passed, or so she supposed, having no means to tell how fast or slow time was advancing. For some time, the slayer wriggled to free herself from the chains, but they held firm. _It’s no use. Probably Mi… Yuki has checked thoroughly that a slayer can’t break them, and when she did she was not weakened by blood drain like I am now. What can I do? There’s no way out!_

Julie panicked again and she broke out in a cold sweat. Then she calmed herself down and tried once more to find a solution, but to no avail. Was it true? Could she only end her ordeal by becoming a vampire, one of those hateful creatures she had been chosen to fight and destroy? She would prefer death, but that was not granted to her; only pain and suffering until she would finally succumb and allow herself to be turned. And if this fate was inevitable, was there a point in enduring the torture?

 

_Maybe it doesn’t matter if I rise again after death? It won’t be me, just a monster with my face and my memories. Maybe I will be simply gone and it will all be someone else’s problem? Why not? Just sleep…_

_But I’m the slayer. Slayers don’t surrender!_

_But then again, Yuki once did._

\---

 

Julie tried to suspend her thoughts and find some sleep, in order to regain some of her strength. It was cold in her pitch black dungeon and she was fearful, but exhaustion finally let her doze off. Yet she just found herself caught in nightmares that sprang, for once, not from the memories of former slayers, but from within her own terrified mind. In all of them she saw the dear face of a loved one who suddenly transformed into a mortal foe.

 

After awakening again, Julie lay in the dark, waiting. She wondered how much time had passed. It must have been night again, Julie supposed. Was Yuki tormenting her by just letting her wait for her return until she lost her mind, alone in the dark? She had once learned about a girl named Drusilla, who had been driven into madness before her siring and had thus become an especially crazy vampire. Was that to be her fate too?

 

Finally, after a painstaking amount of time, the hatch was opened. Julie braced herself. What would she tell Yuki? Would she find the strength to resist and endure the torture? She could not say.

 

In the dim light which fell in from the upper room she discerned the shape of the person who came climbing down the stairs. To her surprise, Julie recognized the delicate figure of Monique. The young vampire reached the floor and turned towards the slayer, with the same loathing in her eyes as the previous night. Julie waited for the other vampires to follow, but no one appeared.

 

The captive’s mind raced. Monique seemed to have come alone. Had Yuki sent her to start with the torture session? But that didn’t make sense. Hadn’t she said that she would ask Julie again for her decision before she would harm her? But if Yuki hadn’t sent Monique, then had the girl come with her own bad intentions? She hated Julie and reeked of jealousy. Could the slayer make use of this to spare herself from the worst fate? If there was no hope of escape, then the delicate vampire’s anger towards her, as a rival in her leader’s favour, could at least offer her the chance of a quick and easy permanent death – or maybe not so quick and easy, but at least a death from which she would not rise again as a soulless creature. Julie reckoned that her best, or rather least repugnant, option lay in provoking the vampire girl into killing her fast in fierce rage.

 

“So what have you come for, baby monster?” Julie teased her, hoping that her voice didn’t tremble, “Are your little fangs already sharp enough to reach my veins? But no, I guess you are curious about your mistress’ new girl, am I right? Maybe you have come to try what Yuki has tasted already?”

 

The slayer’s words did not seem to fail the purpose. Monique hissed at her furiously. Then the vampire replied, with hardly maintained calm and a noticeable Franco-Canadian accent:

 

“Do not talk about Yuki-san any more, or I will tear you apart here and now! If you want to get out of here alive, I say you keep your mouth shut, _putain_!”

 

Julie kept her breath. _Get out alive?_ Was this another one of Yuki’s cruel tricks, a part of her torture? Giving her hope and taking it away again? In any case, she decided to follow Monique’s suggestion for the moment and to refrain from provoking the girl any further.

 

The vampire kneeled down at Julie’s right ankle and swiftly opened the lock that held the chain in place. Then she proceeded to the other ankle and to the slayer’s wrists. Julie’s heart jumped. Even if it was a trick, it might give her a fighting chance. At least she might die standing.

 

After the last lock had sprung open, Julie struggled to get up on her feet. But she fell back down immediately, noticing that the loss of blood had weakened her even more than she had thought. Hesitantly, Monique grabbed her under the arms and helped her to reach the ladder. Heavily panting, and with some pushing from the vampire, Julie managed to climb up. At its top end, she found herself situated in the middle of the cabin where the day before she had waited for Michiko, like a silly sheep waiting for its slaughter. Instinctively, she looked around for her bag with her stake and crossbow, but it was nowhere in sight.

 

Monique hurried to the kitchenette and returned to Julie with a piece of cloth soaked in water.

 

“Wash yourself! You are full of blood. Every vampire can smell you from a mile away. _Vite, vite_!

 

“Why are you helping me? And where are the other vampires?” Julie asked confused, while she rubbed down the dried blood.

 

“I am not helping you!” Monique replied angrily, “If the choice was mine, I would really tear you apart and suck you dry. But I need you to get lost. You will run and stay away! But beware! Yuki-san and the others are out to hunt. She had to let them feed before they return to drain you. It is not easy for vampires to restrain themselves when we suck a slayer. Your blood is…powerful and mouth-watering! And it is even harder when we are hungry, so they went out to find some prey. I volunteered to watch you, but I don’t know when they will come back. So you must stay in a hiding place! They must not catch you again! So hurry now, _putain_!”

 

“I will! Just give me some more water! And where is my bag? I need something to dress.”

 

“You will be fine without! We threw the bag into the river. Too many ugly pointy weapons inside. And I will not even think about wasting one of Yuki-san’s beautiful Japanese dresses on you slayer scum.”

 

Julie sighed. _Okay, running through the woods naked is not my biggest problem right now._ While Monique wetted the cloth again, Julie still wondered why the girl, who hated her so much, would set her free instead of killing her. Then, suddenly, she understood.

 

“You can’t just kill me, because she wouldn’t understand it, am I right? Just like yesterday when you kissed me in front of the cabin and blew Yuki’s cover. It had not been lack of self-control, as she thought. You wanted me to find out about her and force her to kill me. It must have been a shock for you when she still wanted to keep me in her company after all, even turn me into a vampire.”

 

Monique gazed at her fiercely, but did not object.

 

“And if you had killed me now, she would have thought again that you just were not able to control yourself”, Julie concluded.

 

The girl answered grimly, “I send you away, and she will understand that I did it not for greed, but because you threaten us. You have confused her, because she once was a slayer too, but when you are gone, she will see that you are not worth it. I am the one with whom she wants to spend eternity. _Certainement_ , she will first be angry. Maybe she will even torture me in your place, but finally she will see the truth about our love!”

 

Julie looked at the young vampire thoughtfully. Was the delicate girl really convinced that Yuki, with her megalomaniac ideas of a superior vampire breed, had sired her as more than a play toy? She felt a spark of pity for the girl. But she reminded herself that Monique was nothing more than a vampire without a soul, whose love delusions had given her the chance to escape.

 

Nevertheless, she felt that she owed her a word of gratitude. She stopped at the door and thanked Monique for saving her life in the language she had learned from her grandmother:

 

“ _Je te remercie de m'avoir sauvé la vie!_ “

 

Monique still looked at her scornfully and replied in a threatening tone.

 

“ _Et je te la prendrai, si tu t'approches de ma femme à nouveau!_ “

 

Julie left nearly amused, despite the mortal danger that was still pending over her. The delicate vampire had just threatened to kill her if she ever got close to Yuki again. The girl was brave at least. In full possession of her forces, the slayer was probably able to turn her to dust within seconds. Somehow Julie hoped she would not be forced to do so after all, as she was in no position to fulfil Monique’s wish. She had to approach Yuki again – but with a stake in her hand.

 

 

 

\--------------------


	4. Chapter 4

Standing naked in the woods, chilled in the night air, and so weak that she could hardly stay on her feet, Julie was well aware that her chances of coming through the night alive and unenslaved were still not very high. She decided that it was too dangerous to move into the direction of Greenfall, as the vampires would probably hunt where humans lived. Julie preferred not to think about the danger to her family and the townspeople, but she knew well that in her present condition she could not do much to protect them. So she headed away from town, up the river, to find a hideout somewhere in the forests. Then she remembered a detail from her childhood. She moved away from the river to the rock slope where she used to play with her friend and her brother. Coughing, Julie climbed the slope, while she looked out for a place that she had not seen in many years. The moonlight was not as strong as a couple of days ago, but it still gave her some light as it shone on the white rocks. For twenty minutes she looked around desperately, until she finally saw the small crack that she remembered. She squeezed herself in and sank down exhausted in the small cave where she and her brother had once hidden their treasures. Those days they had both fit in; now the grown-up Julie could hardly stretch her legs. But despite her uncomfortable position, she fell into a deep, even dreamless sleep almost immediately.

 

Much later, the slayer woke up again with an aching back and a dry throat. She still felt battered and overwrought, but her mind lighted up when she saw a veil of bright light shining through the entrance of the cave. Painfully she turned around in the narrow hole and looked outside. The sun stood high in a sky of perfect blue over the ample green forests of Maine. In the distance, the Appalachian Mountains rose majestically. Julie gasped with relief. She had made it through the night.

 

Her legs still protested, but Julie felt fit enough to walk back home. She still had to avoid the roads and stay hidden in the bushes though, not any more for fear of running into her vampire foes, but for the less dangerous, but awkward risk to have to explain to some god-fearing citizen of Greenfall why she was ranging the woods naked and bruised. But Julie knew every molehill around her town. Just two hours later, and after only some minor detours, she reached her small house. She cursed when she remembered that the keys lay somewhere in the river together with the rest of her luggage, but fortunately Julie knew how to force the old warped kitchen window open. Having spent her last strength climbing in, Julie staggered towards her bed and very soon sleep overwhelmed her once again.

 

Sounds of the near forest made Julie start up repeatedly during the next night. The night before she had rested hidden from the vampire gang in the protecting cave, but now they would know where to find her. She had recovered to some extent, but still she was in no condition to fight off half a dozen vampires, one of them with the additional skills of a slayer. The only thing that protected her was the ancient mystical rule that kept those creatures from entering a residence without the owner’s invitation. Fortunately, she reckoned, Yuki posing as Michiko had been so confident that she'd never even bothered to manoeuver Julie into inviting her home.

 

The long night finally ended and once again sunlight lifted the slayer’s heart. Had Yuki given up on her plan? Maybe she did not expect to get hold of Julie alive for a second time, now that the slayer was on alert. Had she left with her gang? And if she had, how would Julie track her down in order to turn the treacherous beast into dust? Yet, something inside her doubted that the slayer-vampire would abandon her schemes so easily.

 

\---

 

When the sun nearly stood at its highest point, Julie got dressed for the hunt. She wore some of her older pants and shirts from among those which she had left behind days ago, when she had packed her bag joyfully to start her promising new life with the alleged Michiko. She also kept a number of stakes in reserve, and even a spare crossbow which she had seldom used. It did not lie in her hand as smoothly as the other one that was now dumped in the river, but it served its purpose. Thus well-armed, the slayer marched back to the vacation cabin that had turned into a vampire lair.

 

She was walking up the main road, already close to the point where the connection to the cabin branched off, when a police car passed by and stopped in front of her.

 

“Julie! Julie Blanchard!” Deputy Burley called at her from the car window.

 

Julie gave him a short nod, unwilling to be delayed in her crusade.

 

“You may better not wander around outside town, girl!” the deputy told her. “It’s not safe until we catch that beast.”

 

Julie was puzzled. What did the police know about all this?

 

“A beast?” she inquired.

 

“Haven’t you heard? It’s been the talk of town yesterday. Again only been talking to your frogs, have you? There’s been a young couple from Boston that was camping at the river and has been attacked by a bear. Nearly tore them two apart. You would not have wanted to see their corpses. Ferocious beast that one must be. Didn’t even eat them up. Must have been pure bloodlust.”

 

_Tell me about it…_

The hunt that Yuki and the others had been on, while Monique had released her. The feeding they needed so they could restrain themselves from sucking their captive dry. These two young people had been the unsuspecting, innocent prey.

 

_If it weren’t for my naivety, they would probably still be alive._

_She’ll pay for it!_

“Did you hear me, girl?” the deputy interrupted her grim musings. “You’d best walk back to town and hunt frogs another day. Shall I give you a ride?”

 

“No thanks, Deputy Burley! I’ll be fine!”

 

She continued on her way. With a shake of his head, the deputy did the same.

 

\---

 

The front of the cabin conveniently lay in sunlight when Julie arrived at the place. Without hesitation, the slayer kicked in the door. Despite her expectations, she hoped to hear shrieks and smell burning vampire flesh at the entering of the sunbeams. But, as she had anticipated, the room was empty. With an unpleasant feeling in her guts, she opened the hatch to the cellar that had been her prison; but no sign of a vampire could be found. The whole cabin looked nearly untouched, as if nothing bad had ever happened there.

 

Stepping out into the open air again, Julie noticed a pole at the side of the cabin. A piece of cloth was attached to it like a flag. She went closer and recognized the cloth that Monique had handed to her so she could wash away her blood. Then Julie saw what Yuki wanted to bring to her attention through that bizarre sign.

 

Attached to posts of the veranda, as well as to two poles thrust into the earth a bit further away, the chains that had held Julie down in the cellar lay on the ground. They were empty, though the locks were closed. In between, the sunlit meadow was covered by a gray, powdery substance that the slayer recognized immediately. It was the ashes of a vampire burnt up in sunlight.

 

Julie gazed down at Monique’s pitiful remains with a kind of sadness that she had never expected to feel over the end of a vampire. But apart from the fact that the girl had saved her life – no matter for what reason – and had been executed for doing so, the two women had also shared the same cruel fate. They both had fallen for the same evil seductress, who promised love, but inflicted pain and death in the end.

 

In the tool shed Julie found a spade, and she covered Monique’s ashes with earth. Maybe she had been nothing more than a soulless vampire, but the slayer grieved for the caring young woman she must once have been. A woman that ceased to be when Yuki tore away her humanity at the moment of her siring. Now she had destroyed even the rest, unwilling or unable to forgive an act of disobedience out of love.

 

_What a monster I have loved!_

The slayer added Monique’s sacrifice to the list of events for which she sought revenge.

 

\---

 

Later that day, Julie knocked on the door of Northcutt’s hut. She hated to come crawling to her watcher to confess her fatal mistake and suffer his inevitable scorn and reproaches. Yet she had to know which information the Council could give her on their fallen slayer, Yuki Makimura.

 

Northcutt opened the door and looked at her scornfully.

 

“Look whom we’ve got here! The slayer finally feels in the mood to give the pleasure of her presence! Have you got any reasonable excuse for going underground for four days and nights, while tourists are slaughtered at the roadside and demons come flooding in?”

 

“Mr. Northcutt, I…”, she started.

 

“No”, he interrupted, “spare me the excuses! Thankfully, I don’t have to deal with all that any more. Your wilfulness is no longer my problem.”

 

The slayer looked at him baffled. What did he mean by that?

 

A younger man appeared in the door. He saw Julie and bowed his head slightly, then offered his hand to her.

 

“Ms. Blanchard, I assume? I am very pleased to meet you.”

 

Julie shook the hand blankly. “Julie Blanchard, yes! And you are…”

 

“My name is Merrick. I have been sent by the Watchers Council. I suppose Mr. Northcutt will allow me to invite you in? There are matters that we have to discuss."

 

Julie followed the men inside and they all sat down around the large table in Northcutt’s living room. A cup of tea was offered to her. Then the stranger continued.

 

"Ms. Blanchard, you are aware that the Council has always monitored your work closely. It has analyzed Mr. Northcutt’s reports and is... worried that the relationship between you and your watcher may not be sufficiently trustful to ensure optimal cooperation and support for your responsibilities.”

 

Northcutt gasped in protest.

 

“It is, of course, not the Council’s intent to lay blame on anyone”, the young man said quickly. “They just have to deal with the common phenomenon that two persons obviously cannot get along with each other. But your mission, Ms. Blanchard, is way too important for us not to interfere in this situation. Therefore I have to inform you that the Council has decided to release Mr. Northcutt from his duties and to assign me as your new watcher. I hope this decision finds your approval.”

 

“Ah… I guess so”, Julie answered in surprise. She studied Merrick. He was probably in his early 30’s, a bit chubby, with a small moustache. There was an apprehensive expression around his eyes, which started to engrave small wrinkles between his brows. He seemed a bit too grave, but in his look and manners she saw respect and concern. The recent experience with Yuki had taught her not to confide in her judgement about other persons’ trustworthiness anymore, but she decided to give her new watcher a chance, at least for the time being.

 

“I suppose you had a good reason for not getting into contact with your watcher these last four days, Ms. Blanchard”, Merrick said, making Julie smile internally about his careful diplomatic approach, “and I hope that we will build up a relationship of understanding, so that you will not find it preferable to act alone, without referring to the assistance that your watcher should give you.”

 

“Noted”, she said. The new situation gave her the chance to avoid telling Northcutt about her lapses, but as the grumpy old man was still sitting at the table, she stalled. Merrick obviously comprehended.

 

“We may have time for a debriefing tomorrow morning, when we will start our training units. If this is alright for you?”

 

Julie nodded. Merrick gave her a hint of a knowing smile and continued.

 

“We should, however, have a word on the current crisis right now.”

 

“You mean the attack on the tourists?” Julie asked.

 

Merrick looked at her in amazement.

 

“Not only that, I mean the cavalcade of demons rushing in. Haven’t you noticed? In the last days more and more of them are arriving. So far it’s mostly those of the annoying types, but for sure in a short time there will be some really mean creatures showing up. Everything hints to a sudden surge of the demonic black energy which is emitted by the interdimensional rift in Gossamer Forest. That is quite an unpleasant surprise. Our experts, who monitor shifts in the supernatural forces, expected the rift to slowly evaporate over the next months. Instead, it seems to grow now. It’s as if some containing force, that had kept it in check, had suddenly disappeared.

 

Julie shuddered. A terrible suspicion rose within her, as Yuki’s words resounded in her ears. _“The creature was in fact one of the good guys”_.

 

“Could this containing force have been a mountain demon, a troll?” she probed, fearing the answer.

 

Merrick’s eyes widened. “That’s possible! What do you know about it?”

 

Julie gulped. Slowly she answered.

 

“There was a troll in Gossamer Forest. I know that he was killed some days ago by… by a vampire and her companion.”

 

“That is serious!” Merrick said in an alarmed tone. “I think I remember that there has been a case in Japan where a mountain demon had held a rift towards a demonic dimension in check, until he was killed by a large gang of vampires. The demons that flocked in afterwards depopulated a couple of villages.”

 

_Oh no, what did I do? What did she make me do?_

"If you are right about the troll", Merrick continued, "this town might be in considerable danger. Fortunately it is the home of the slayer! I am sure you will be able to deal with this threat and I will do my best to assist you. Also the information you retrieved about the troll could be very helpful to understanding the exact nature of the rift; and that might enable the Council to find a way to manipulate it. I will report to London immediately after our conversation. I have to thank you for obtaining this knowledge. Obviously your endeavours during those last days were very valuable."

 

_Yeah, I'm a real hero,_ Julie thought bitterly.

 

"It’s a pity though, that this unexpected crisis will require your further presence here in Greenfall, at least for the moment. I am very sorry about this, as Mr. Northcutt has mentioned your eagerness to leave your hometown. I told you that the Council had assumed, until recently, that the rift was in the course of closing. So it wanted to propose your relocation to another place with elevated demon activity, such as New York City, Los Angeles or Paris. I really regret that the new circumstance confound such a plan."

 

Julie felt devastated. After everything else she had brought upon herself, since she had been so foolish to trust that snake Yuki, she now learnt that she had also quashed her hopes of leaving Greenfall.

 

For a long moment, the girl allowed herself to delve into her misery. Then she called herself to order. She had made a mistake. Mistakes entailed consequences. And those consequences she had to face. And being the slayer, she would.

 

Julie got up.

 

"If that's all for now", she said to her new watcher, "I'd prefer to return home in order to prepare for my patrol. Night is falling soon."

 

"I think we're all done for now, Ms. Blanchard. We'll talk again tomorrow. Take care!"

 

Julie headed out of the door. But there was something left that nagged inside her. She stopped at the entrance and turned around, looking at Merrick inquiringly.

 

"Tell me", she asked him in a determined voice, "are there any secrets that the Council is keeping from me? Does it have any kind of hidden agenda?"

 

Merrick seem to flinch slightly at the question, but he held her gaze.

 

"Ms. Blanchard", he said carefully, "the Council is a very old organization, and like every organization run by humans, it is affected by intrigue, incompetence and ulterior motivations. There are factions that are not always cooperating as they should, and there are individuals that are not so noble as it should be expected from them. So I probably can't guarantee that there aren't any bits of information that one or the other of the Council's members are not eager to share. But I can assure you, that essentially the Council has honourable motives. And for what it's worth, I give you my personal promise that I myself do not and will not withhold anything from you."

 

Julie nodded slowly. That answer from her watcher was acceptable.

 

Again she wanted to leave, but again she turned around to Merrick. There was another thing she wanted to be certain of, although in reality she already knew it. Again she faced him directly, searching for signs of deception in his eyes as she asked her question.

 

"Are there others like me? Slayers I mean. Not those before me, but living girls, somewhere out there in the world?"

 

He looked at her with compassion; and Julie saw that this man understood her loneliness. She had no reason to doubt his honesty when he answered.

 

"There has always been only one slayer at a time, since days immortal. Once she... passes, the next one is called. I... am sorry, Julie!"

 

\---

 

The sun had disappeared over Greenfall and Julie Blanchard, the Slayer, the only one of her kind, stood in the middle of her house, checking her equipment before going out on patrol. She was aware that her hometown was in danger, and as much as she had hoped to leave this place eventually, she would not let it go down. Even if she had not been the one who had brought this danger upon it herself...

 

Julie shouldered the small bag with her arrows and auxiliary stakes and put the crossbow into its holster. A small handy axe was already attached to her belt. Then she switched off the lights and opened the door. She stepped out into the night - and jumped back with a start. Five pairs of eyes stared at her. Four of them were red as blood and gazed at her hatefully from distorted faces - the demon faces of vampires ready to kill. But Julie took notice of them only so far as her slayer instincts demanded it. Her main attention lay upon the fifth pair of eyes - the deep brown eyes of Yuki alias Michiko, her treacherous lover who had become her worst enemy. The tall Japanese vampire showed her human face and smiled at Julie with fake warmth.

 

"Good evening, my love! Ready for patrolling, I see. Do you want me to join, for old times' sake?" she asked mockingly.

 

Julie answered only with a vengeful gaze, while she assessed the situation. She had stepped back into the house. Thus she was momentarily protected from the immediate attack of the vampires who could not enter without invitation. Yet she could not hole herself up in there. After all, she wanted to take these vampires down. She had searched for them and hoped to get the chance to slay them. Now it was them who had chosen the fighting ground and Julie had to react and look for her advantages, but that did not change the fact that this was the confrontation which she had sought as well. She was ready for it.

 

"Come out now, will you?" Yuki said in her sweetest voice, "you know that we have some business to finish, and I think we all want to go through with it."

 

Julie snorted.

 

"So you've finally come to abduct me again and turn me into your vampire consort? Don't even dream about it! You deceived me once with your lies and caught me off guard, but you won't be able to play that trick on me again. I'm fit and I'm armed. Try to capture me again and I will turn you into dust! In fact, do as you like, because I will turn you into dust anyway!"

 

Yuki's annoying smile broadened even more.

 

"Oh, don't you worry about that, Julie dear! I no longer have the intention to sire you. I was maybe a bit too enthusiastic when I came up with that idea. But you see, I gave it second thoughts after you denied my prolonged hospitality. Let's face it" - the expression on her face got stern - "you're trouble, honey! Headstrong and obstinate. Appropriate qualities for a slayer, for sure, but I don’t need that among my followers. I need acolytes who obey me. You'd never do that. If I sired you, sooner or later we would be at each others necks - metaphorically speaking, not in that sexy, bloodsucking kind of way."

 

"That's very probable, as you kill everyone you can't control, ain't it so?" Julie barked. "Even if it's a poor little fool like the unfortunate Monique. The girl that you burnt in sunlight, just because she could not stand being replaced by someone else in your bed. Or your coffin or wherever..."

 

"Because she defied me!" Yuki shouted in sudden anger.

 

"She was crazy in love with you! More than you ever deserved!" Julie hissed back. "And she believed in you! Followed you into a new life, just to see all her hopes smashed by your betrayal."

 

Yuki looked at her and started to smile maliciously. With a grin she asked:

 

"Are we even still taking about Monique?"

 

Julie trembled with rage at the humiliation of exposing her feelings like this.

 

_Be a slayer! Don't let your emotions distract you in a fight!_

 

"It doesn't matter what we are talking about. It's not talking you have come for", Julie said, calmer again.

 

"You are right in that regard. So I suppose you will not hide in your house anymore and start the fight?" the vampire replied.

 

Julie gave her a cool look. "Nothing I'll enjoy more than slaying you, snake! But I'd be the biggest fool to believe in your assertions that you have given up on siring me. I will fight you, but not with your minions in my back, waiting for an opportunity to beat and capture me while I'm facing you."

 

"They will not interfere!" Yuki said.

 

"No, they won't!" Julie confirmed. "But there's a better way to see to that than by relying on your worthless reassurances."

 

Julie switched on the lights again and stepped back from the door, to the back of her living room.

 

"I invite you in, Yuki, but you alone. If you want to fight, enter!"

 

Yuki looked surprised for a moment, than she smiled approvingly.

 

"Swift move, little slayer! You are aware though, that we could set the house on fire and force you to come out?"

 

"I am, of course! But would the superior slayer-vampire chicken out of fighting me one on one? I guess you'd have to kill all your minions afterwards, because they would hardly take any more orders from a coward, no?" Julie hoped that Yuki would take the bait. The possibility of the vampires setting fire was indeed the week point of her impromptu plan.

 

Yuki nodded. "Very well, one on one then! We had fun that way before, didn't we?" She drew her sword and stepped into Julie's house without hesitation. The other vampires tried to follow immediately, just to smash their noses at the invisible barrier that denied them entry. They growled in frustration.

 

Their leader stopped in the middle of the room and faced the slayer, who was aiming at her with her loaded crossbow. Julie loosened her shot without further ramblings. The vampire ducked and the arrow whooshed past her, getting stuck in the wall. Julie hurried to load her weapon again, but the vampire’s counterattack was too fast. So she dropped the crossbow and drew the axe from her belt, just in time to stop Yuki’s sword that was thrust down on her. The vampire struck again various times, only to see all her thrusts being blocked through Julie’s quick reaction. The slayer moved swiftly and skilfully, avoiding the sharp sword, but she could not take the offensive herself. Yuki’s fine weapon gave the vampire a dangerous advantage. Julie understood that she had to concentrate on disarming her enemy. She noticed growing frustration on the vampire’s part as thrust after thrust was absorbed by the slayer’s simple axe. Julie realized that she had to exploit this reaction. Maybe, in the thick of the fight, Yuki was not as disciplined as she loved to consider herself.

 

Enraged, the vampire reached back in order to apply a stronger thrust, holding the sword high above her head. This gave Julie the chance to strike. The slayer turned half around and her leg shot up, kicking her enemy in the stomach. Yuki faltered, but much to Julie’s disappointment, she did not drop the sword. Julie knew she had to strike again before the vampire would regain her balance and thrust down the sword on her. She aimed at her enemy’s chest with her axe. Yuki was able to lower her weapon into a defensive position in time to intercept the attack, but Julie’s axe slid along the blade down to the hilt, smashing the vampire’s fingers. Screaming out, she withdrew her right hand. With the left, she retracted the sword, pulling away the axe that had gotten entangled at its head. Both weapons flew to the ground at the other side of the room.

 

Their hands empty, the opponents faced each other. The vampire’s gaze went from her bleeding fingers to the slayer. Then she said with a wry grin:

 

“Isn’t that marvellous? Two warriors, fighting till death? One wins and one dies. Only that you, no matter who will prevail, will lose either way.”

 

Julie moaned inside.

 

_Will she never stop her self-pleasing blather?_

But she found that she could use some time for recovering, so she decided to take the bait:

 

“And how is that?”

 

The vampire did not hesitate to continue.

 

“Because even if you win this fight, you will end up alone. I am the only one that is like you in the world. The only other slayer. You hate me now, but without me you will only be what you were before you met me – an isolated freak.”

 

Julie could not believe her ears. How self-absorbed was that crazy girl? Involuntarily she felt a dry smile forming on her own lips. Yuki watched this with obvious confusion.

 

“You still think that you can play that card on me again?” Julie asked her. “You’re so pathetic, Yuki! I AM the only slayer! I was the only slayer in the world since the day I was called. And your presence doesn’t change that. Because you ceased to be like me centuries ago. Okay, so you preserved some skills and instincts, but that’s not what it means to be a slayer. But maybe you never really understood that, even when you were alive; or you would never have let yourself be turned into what you were meant to fight.”

 

Julie saw Yuki gazing at her in baffled anger. At once, she saw her enemy clearly.

 

“It’s you who will always lose”, she continued. “You may kill me, but at the same moment another girl will be called to take my place. The chain will continue, forever and ever, but it will never lead back to you. There will always be the one slayer, living and breathing. You might kill her or try to corrupt her by turning her into an abominable creature like you are. But there will always be a new one to become what you are no longer.

 

“Is that it, Yuki? When you allowed yourself to be sired, did you expect that you’d break the chain and stay the only slayer until eternity? Only to find out that the chain continued without you and you were just turned into that…thing that you are? Just another vampire! The kind that slayers fight and destroy.”

 

“Then try to destroy me!” Yuki shouted and jumped forward in a wild rage. A violent punch hit Julie's chest. The slayer fell backwards, dashing her grandmother’s old table into pieces. The vampire kicked her stomach, to the cheers of her acolytes that were still waiting at the open, yet impenetrable door. Julie suffered another painful punch, but she got hold of her adversary’s leg and took the vampire down. Yuki fell on top of her and immediately she tried to get Julie’s throat into her grip and to sink her fangs into her. But a strong blow with one of the broken table’s legs in Julie’s hand stopped her attack. The slayer pushed her enemy away and struggled to get back onto her feet. She prepared to thrust again with the heavy piece of oak wood, but the vampire had rolled to the side and was also getting up. She hissed at the slayer and glanced at her ferociously. With the remains of the table now between them, Yuki had gotten closer to the spot where Julie’s axe and her own sword were lying on the floor. Julie did not fail to notice the vampire’s short glimpse in that direction. She managed to start first and to reach Yuki before she could get hold of her blade. She grabbed the vampire’s arm and dragged her back. Julie fell on her back, Yuki heavily above her. The back of her enemy’s head crashed into Julie’s face, sending a flash of pain through the slayer. But she hardly noticed her broken nose, because at the very same moment she realized the weapon she had directly in front of her eyes. The vampire broke free from her grip, but Julie had already drawn one of the long white needles out of Yuki’s black hair. A moment later both women were on their feet again. Just a small second was left for Yuki to look startled at the needle in Julie’s hand, before the slayer’s arm shot forward and drove the pointy piece of wood deeply into Yuki’s chest, directly into the vampire’s heart.

 

Yuki stumbled back and stared at the slayer with terrified wide eyes. The other vampires at the door screamed in shock. Then, after a seemingly endless second, Yuki looked down at the needle protruding from her chest, grabbed it, and with a painful groan she tore it out. She held it up in front of her and both she and Julie looked with astonishment at the thin steel thorn at its tip.

 

The lid must have fallen off when she drew the needle out of Yuki’s hair, the slayer realized. She had staked the vampire with iron, not with wood.

 

She hurried to attack her enemy again before Yuki could recover from the shock of nearly getting turned to dust. But the vampire reacted quickly and thrust at Julie with the needle which was still in her hand. The slayer retreated – and stumbled.

 

Julie never got to know that the object she tripped over was her own crossbow. She only saw the vampire dropping the needle and jumping at her, while she fought to regain her balance. She felt Yuki’s hands pressing at her head and swirling it around. A monstrous crack, as loud as thunder, in her ears, and a short flash of enormous pain in the neck were the last things she was aware of, before she felt the world around her disappear.

 

The fight was over. Yuki watched her enemy go limp and fall down. The slayer’s dead body had not even touched the ground when the barrier at the door dissolved. Four vampires stormed with triumphant howling into the house whose sole resident was no longer alive. Greedily they pounced on Julie’s corpse, tearing off the clothes from her arms, legs and belly. Then they sank in their fangs and sucked the slayer’s blood hungrily.

 

Yuki stood above the scene, watching it for minutes without a move. After some time, Elisabeth looked up to her. The blond vampire’s chin dripped with blood.

 

“Won’t you drink, Yuki-san? See, we left the neck for you!”

 

Yuki blinked, and then she kneeled down at the side of the slayer’s body. Her followers respectfully made way for her. Slowly she reached for Julie’s head, which hung sideways from the broken neck at a grotesque angle, and put it straight. Then she closed her victim’s staring eyes. The vampire leaned forward and carefully, nearly tenderly, she kissed the deceased slayer. Then she too sank her fangs into the still warm body and drank greedily.

 

\---

 

The sun bathed Greenfall with the light of another warm summer afternoon. Merrick mused that its cheerfulness seemed terribly inappropriate with regard to the occasion.

 

_It should rain on funerals,_ he thought.

 

He wiped down some sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief, while he watched the townspeople walk away slowly after the end of the ceremony at the small town's graveyard. He had had the chance to talk to some of them earlier that day, and he felt that none of them had been particularly close to young Julie Blanchard. They had considered her some kind of loner, with an air of sobriety around her that did not seem to correspond with her age. Some had even found her weird, mostly due to her obsession with frogs. It was rumoured that she had spent whole nights out in the wilderness for her research on amphibians. An old lumberjack even claimed that he had seen her running through the woods totally naked just a few days earlier, but the strong scent of Bourbon emanating from the man made Merrick doubt that last statement. Yet the townspeople were not indifferent to the girl’s death. She had stayed to herself, but had been generally regarded as obliging and reliable, and there was a genuine air of grief among the visitors of Julie’s funeral.

 

The reverend had spoken with solemnity and routine. He did not fail to point out the tragic irony that a young woman with a dedication to eventually become a world class biologist got killed by a raving bear in her own house.

 

Merrick watched the last attender disappear between the birch trees that grew along the gravel road outside the cemetery. Just the gravediggers had stayed behind and followed their work in silence. He and Northcutt were the only other people remaining on the site, two alleged scientists, who purportedly had come to the funeral to honour their young research assistant.

 

“A bear!” the grouchy Englishman said derisively. “I have never actually seen a bear victim, but I am quite sure he would not drain the whole blood from a body without eating any flesh. And leave small round bites in pairs by two and two. The authorities didn’t really give much thought to this.”

 

“Which always makes it easier for us to not alert the general public to the vampire threat”, Merrick responded. “In the end people tend to see what is most easily explainable to them; what fits best into their image of the world. Bad luck though for some poor, innocent bear which I am sure they’ll hunt down now.”

 

Merrick’s mind wandered to the image of the dead slayer which Northcutt had brought back with his remark. Ravaged and with a broken neck, Julie Blanchard had been lying beside a destroyed table in her living room when Merrick had found her. She had not arrived for the training unit they had set up at their meeting the day before; and he had felt uneasy, even with all of Northcutt’s assertions that she was just irremediably unreliable. In her presence, Merrick had sensed that the young woman had experienced something disconcerting and wanted to share it with him in confidence. He never got a chance to have this conversation.

 

“I wonder what she had been up against during her last days”, he said. “I’m not willing to believe that a vampire attack on the slayer, in her own house, would have nothing to do with all the other events we’ve seen or learned about. Ms. Blanchard’s disappearance for days. A troll getting killed, assumingly by the same vampire, which widens a rift to a demon dimension. Where’s the connection between all that? And which vampire would dare such attacks? No ordinary one, that’s for sure.”

 

“Didn’t you say that it must have been a whole band of four or five?”

 

“There were marks from five pairs of fangs”, Merrick confirmed. “But even in groups, most vampires would hardly dare to engage the slayer in an open fight. I reckon that one of them is different, one of the most dangerous and confident ones, probably very old. But did Ms. Blanchard know whom she was fighting? Did she know whom she invited in?”

 

“We’ll never find out what that girl had in her stubborn mind at that moment”, Northcutt said in a disrespectful tone that annoyed Merrick. “Maybe she simply had no idea what she was doing. I am very moved by her death, but, allow me to be so blunt, she probably had it coming. Always so undisciplined and headstrong. Probably that confrontation was all a game to her, until she couldn’t handle it anymore.”

 

Merrick’s answer was sharp. “Allow me to be blunt too, Mr. Northcutt, but I think you’ve let her down. I have met Ms. Blanchard for only a very short time. But from my personal impression and from what I could filter out of your unfavourable reports, I am convinced that her mission was anything but a game to that young woman. She seemed very dedicated and sober-minded to me. When you call her undisciplined, then remember that she was a slayer, not a puppy. That girl had to live with a purpose that she didn’t choose, but which she fulfilled anyway. Have you ever tried to conceive what it means to be a slayer? What it asks of those girls? What it takes from them? The least we can offer them is support. We train them to prevail in what is demanded from them against their will. And we try to help them to survive a little bit longer. But this slayer fought her last battle alone, because she did not feel she could trust her watcher any more. I don’t think she failed, Northcutt, I think that you failed her.”

 

Merrick saw the older man eyeing him in anger, but no objection came. Instead Northcutt changed the topic.

 

“You have been in contact with the Council? Did they give us any instructions on how to proceed?”

 

“Yes, I talked to them earlier today. I’m afraid you’ll have to wait a little bit longer before you can return to England. We still have the threat of the unchecked rift to deal with, and must expect hordes of demons coming to Greenfall. The slayer was our best asset in this crisis. Her loss intensifies the danger for the town, and maybe all the counties around it. The Council agrees with my assessment of the situation and will send in some trained demon hunters. It also requests that you shall give them technical assistance, as you have known the area for two years.”

 

Northcutt’s face displayed frustration, but he nodded sourly.

 

“Let’s hope they will be able to cope with the demon armada”, he responded in a sarcastic voice. “I have no wish to end up here in this derelict graveyard too.”

 

Merrick did not react to his irreverence.

 

“Fortunately”, the younger man said, “Ms. Blanchard’s information on the nature of the rift may indeed help us to find a solution. The Council’s records on trolls and their crude magical abilities are quite exhaustive. Now that we know that the rift could be held in check by one of those creatures, our witches may be able to find a means to control it too. With some luck we will even succeed in closing it altogether.”

 

He paused. “We should regard this as the slayer’s last gift to her hometown.”

 

Northcutt stared blankly at Julie’s grave.

 

After some time, he turned to Merrick again.

 

“What are your instructions? Do they want you to stay too?”

 

“No”, Merrick answered. “I have received another assignment. The Council has detected the next slayer, who was called at the moment of Ms. Blanchard’s demise. I am appointed as her watcher. In an hour I will depart for Alabama in order to contact her. Unfortunately, she too is untrained, as we failed to identify her as a potential.”

 

“I hope you’ll be doing well then, chap! It’s a difficult job. But it seems that you are very apt in giving people lessons”, Northcutt replied. Merrick could not reproach him with his sarcasm. He had criticized the man quite harshly.

 

“I hope so too”, he conceded. “In a state where segregation has ended just recently, Ms. Johnson might not find it easy to trust someone from our race.”

 

Northcutt looked surprised.

 

“You’re telling me she’s a…”

 

“A black person, yes, Mr. Northcutt! As was the first slayer. And also, I may remind you, the first watchers.”

 

The older man said no more, nodded and went away towards Merrick’s car. The young watcher gazed after him. He felt relieved that in an hour he would leave Northcutt’s hut and see his unwilling housemate no more. Merrick regretted that the Council had not assigned him earlier to Julie Blanchard. With his help, would she have been able to overcome whatever calamity it was that led to the deadly fight in her living room? How much could a watcher really do for his slayer? Would he manage to give his new protégée better backing than this hapless young woman had received?

 

He walked closer to the grave. The headstone read _JULIE BLANCHARD 1948 – 1966_ in freshly cut letters. The gravediggers looked at Merrick curiously for some seconds, and then kept on shovelling. For long minutes the watcher stood there and followed his thoughts.

 

_What was your secret, Julie? Where had you been during those days when you were missing?_

He pondered over the details he had not told Northcutt about.

 

_Why did your body show not only vampire bites from your last fight, but also several others, a couple of days old? Where did you get those bruises on your wrists and ankles? And who put your head straight and closed your eyes?_

He knew that for him these questions would remain without answers.

 

With an unspoken reverence, Merrick turned around and walked away. He reminded himself that he should linger no more. 1600 miles away, another chosen one would have to fight her demons from now on, and he was to be on her side until the bitter day when she too would find an untimely death, while protecting a world that would never take notice of her sacrifice.

 

 

 

\--------------------

 

_DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fanfiction and serves no commercial purpose. I neither possess nor claim any rights to BUFFY, THE VAMPIRE SLAYER or anything connected with it that is under copyright protection. This refers also to the character of Yuki Makimura, which has been introduced by Tom Fassbender and Jim Pascoe in the Comic book "False Memories", published at Dark Horse Comics._

_When I wrote this story, I tried not to contradict established Buffyverse canon. Any inconsistencies have to be judged under the first rule of Whedonites: "Joss is boss." ;-)_


	5. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _I wrote this epilogue as an afterthought, after some of my test readers suggested that the end of Julie's story is too bleak. It is not an alternative ending, but a short sequel which gives a more optimistic closure without changing the main storyline.  
>  The epilogue is not strictly a part of the main story and can be skipped._
> 
> __  
> 

_\--- Thirty years later ---_

 

 

_A monstrous crack, as loud as thunder, in her ears, and a short flash of enormous pain in the neck were the last things she was aware of, before she felt the world around her disappear._

 

With a gasp, Buffy Summers awoke and opened her eyes wide. Anxiety made her stomach tense up. She panted. But she realized that her familiar room surrounded her and she saw morning light shine through the shutters of her window. Slowly the tension eased off.

 

In her dream, she had just witnessed strange events from the distant past. Yet she was aware that she had seen parts of this before – just the other night, in fact; and that other dream had been most revealing. As the slayer, Buffy had often drawn from the experiences of all her predecessors, from their memories that she had inherited at the moment she was called. Those were not always accessible of course, and mostly fuzzy. But every now and then, bits of them came up during confrontations – the memory of a fight, the remembering of a movement that could save her, or of an attack strategy that could be expected from her adversary; and more than once such recollections had helped her to keep the upper hand.

 

On rare occasions though, the images from the past were so intense that a whole story rolled off before her eyes. When that happened, she could even recall a former slayer’s emotions, her fear, her anxiety, her triumphant joy. This had usually occurred when Buffy had faced a major challenge herself, but it had never been so vivid like in this dream and in the one from the night before. But then, she had never had to fight a slayer-turned-vampire before.

 

It had only been days ago when she had found out about Yuki Makimura, the only slayer who had ever succumbed to an existence as a blood-sucking creature and had been erased from the Watchers Council’s official records. On her first encounter with that obnoxious woman Buffy had taken a rough beating. She had learned that Yuki was a dangerous enemy and that she would need all the help she could get in order to defeat her. And then help had come from the past.

 

The other night she had observed Yuki Makimura fighting again and again in her dream. Sometimes she watched her battling a demon or a giant ugly monster somewhere in the woods; sometimes Buffy fought directly against her. No – not Buffy, but another slayer in another time who had had to face the same evil threat. Through the eyes of that long gone young woman she had got the chance to study the slayer-vampire, learn her tricks and skills and, most important, find her weakness.

 

As this past night had fallen, Buffy had got to test these new insights the hard way, when she had to stop Yuki from raising the Master, her creator and the most ancient and dangerous of all vampires, and from sacrificing Buffy’s friend Xander in the process. Once more, the events of this night had brought Sunnydale and her own life, as well as those of her friends and her sister, into mortal danger. Yet once more they had prevailed. Defeating the ex-slayer had been tough, but Buffy found that Yuki’s weakness had remained the same – pride. Not being quite as disciplined as she thought herself to be, the vampire had once again let down her guard while she droned on about her supposed superiority. With her hand on Buffy’s throat, she had talked drivel for a moment too long, not watching her adversary’s hands; and so a stake in her heart had turned the vampire that had once been a slayer into dust.

 

After this hard fight, Buffy had wished for nothing more than a long, deep sleep. Instead, the images from the past had returned, assembling themselves with other memories into a tale. Unlike the night before, she had not just seen fights, but witnessed the echo of the last days in the life of the slayer who had confronted Yuki before. And that confrontation had been intense. Buffy remembered vividly the emotional turmoil within the girl. She recollected moments of happiness and stirringly erotic bliss, but also of abandonment and mortal fear. Some details remained unclear to her, but it was obvious that her predecessor had fallen victim to a masterly executed plot; and though the girl nearly had gained the upper hand after all, finally the slayer-vampire had brought about her downfall.

 

Though agitated by the dream, Buffy still felt whacked from her own fight against Yuki Makimura. And with the new insight of how devious and rogue her defeated enemy really had been, she felt more than entitled to have a good day’s rest. Slowly she sank back into sleep…

 

…and found herself in front of a face from her own past that made her blood freeze in an instant. With sheer horror she saw the Master standing in front of her, smiling grimly into her face. Buffy tried desperately to back off, but she saw that she was trapped in a dark unpaved alley, between odd-looking houses with earthen walls between frameworks of timber. At the same time she noticed that her body felt transformed, taller and leaner than it used to be. Stumbling away from the horrifying foe, she also got aware that she was wearing an unfamiliar dress cut in a style she had never worn before. Looking at her unusually pale hands, Buffy finally understood that she was once again reliving images from another slayer’s past. And from the surroundings, the dress and her body shape she knew easily whose past it was.

 

Knowing that it was yet another dream made her calm down a little, even if it still gave her the goose bumps to stand in front of the Master. But as her own panic subsided, Buffy felt the mortal fear of Yuki Makimura, the vampire slayer, who was just about to lose her final fight against an enemy she was not able to stand up to. _“I don’t want to die”_ , Buffy heard a voice whimper in a foreign language in her head, as the Master’s hand closed around her throat.

 

In an instant the image of the vampire dissolved, together with the alley and its wooden houses. For some moments, Buffy was floating without orientation through a realm of undistinguished forms and colors, but she felt mostly relieved for escaping the unpleasant scene and the memory of her most horrifying enemy. Then slowly the shapes became more solid and she found herself sitting on moist, soft floor and, to her comfort, in her own body.

 

It was still night and completely dark, but for the light that came from the silvery moon high above her. In its glow Buffy could recognize treetops on the other side of a small pond which lay in front of her and reflected the pale light idyllically. On both its banks frogs performed their polyphonic concert.

 

“ _Rana clamitans melanota_ , the northern green frog”, a female voice sounded from her right side. “They mate at ponds like these at this time of the year.” Buffy whirled her head around. Not far from her she saw a girl sitting cross-legged in the grass. She was young, maybe around eighteen, with dark blond hair and a well-trained, yet curvy body. She gave Buffy a friendly smile that had an air of sadness.

 

“You are the slayer from my dream”, Buffy guessed, feeling rather certain about this assumption. “Your name is…Julie, right?” The girl nodded.

 

“You were the one who fought Yuki before.”

 

“I did”, Julie confirmed.

 

“In that case I have to be really grateful. It was a hard fight, but with your memories in my head, I could finish that bloody bitch.”

 

The girl flinched a bit, and Buffy wished she had chosen less flippant words. The Japanese vampire had been that slayer’s nemesis after all.

 

“I am glad I could be of help”, Julie said. It sounded honest, but cheerless. “So she’s dead?”

 

“Yes”, Buffy confirmed.

 

“After all”, the other girl replied. She gazed ahead, lost in thought.

 

Buffy felt a desperate urge to change the topic. She looked around.

 

“This place – it’s like I’ve seen it before. Was it in your dream? I mean – rather my dream, the earlier dream, which then is your memory. Ah, I get a headache! – Wait, yes, I remember! You’ve been here with Yuki. It’s the pond where the two of you…oh! Oh!”

 

Buffy felt her cheeks getting warm. Did she blush? Was it even possible to blush in a dream?

 

Julie still seemed absentminded. “Yes”, she finally answered. “It’s the place where I spent the happiest night of my life.” She looked down sadly.

 

“And all this time since you passed away, you’ve been here?” Buffy inquired sympathetically.

 

Julie looked at her in astonishment. “How’s that? I’m just a dream vision. Or do you think that I’m a ghost?”

 

“Ah, I don’t know…” Buffy was puzzled. “These supernatural questions are really not for me. I usually let Giles find out which kind of phenomenon I have to deal with. No offence…”

 

“Ah yes, your watcher. And your friend. One of your friends. Giles, Willow, Xander…Your approach is really remarkable. You’re not carrying it all alone. You formed a team and they support you. You’re one lucky slayer, Buffy Summers!”

 

Before Buffy could answer, the other girl continued, “I’m afraid I was not so smart in that regard. The only time when I teamed up with someone, she turned out to be a vampire maniac. Isn’t that pathetic?” She snorted scornfully. “She succeeded in making me trust her, but the whole time she just mocked me.”

 

“I’m not so sure about that”, Buffy said, nearly as much to her own surprise as to Julie’s. The girl looked at her uncomprehendingly.

 

“Maybe she really did fall for you. I mean, in this particular perverted vampire ‘I love to kill you’ – kind of way. Just think about it! First she wanted to make you her eternal companion, and after you ran away, she only wanted to kill you once for all. Sounds a lot like spurned love to me.”

 

Ignoring Julie’s frowning, she spoke on, as a bundle of whole new images emerged from the depths of her mind. “For all her arrogance, she must have been impressed by your courage, by the way you faced perdition with much more resolve than she had done back then when she was the slayer. Julie, deep inside she knew that she had not had your strength.”

 

“How would you know about her slayer days?” the other girl inquired. Her eyes suddenly opened wide. “You really can’t know. Unless…”

 

“…I have her memories. Yes, I see them ever more clearly now. I know that no slayer could access them so far. But now Yuki’s vampire existence has ended; that must be the reason that her experiences and feelings suddenly appear in that great slayer movie show in my head.” Buffy contemplated her earlier vision. “Just before I came here, I watched her final fight as the slayer, in some dark alley in Japan. She was killed and turned by a particular horrifying vampire.” She paused and shivered, remembering her own deadly fight against the Master.

 

“You might have thought that she chose to become a vampire in order to be that uberslayer that she bragged about being. But in fact she was just too weak and too scared of dying to resist.” Buffy closed her eyes and concentrated on the echoes from the young Japanese girl who had lived and died two hundred years ago. “I felt your loneliness, Julie, but now I gather that Yuki’s despair was much worse when she was still alive and breathing. I feel her deep sadness as a kid. It seems she was an early orphaned child. I see her being taken to an uncanny place by a scary, insensitive man. I gather he was her watcher.” She frowned as more images came up. “He trained her in fighting and slaying, but without any consideration for her emotional or physical limits. Poor girl! She yearned for someone to connect to, to ease her forlornness, but her watcher would not allow her any social interactions. And when she faced her end in that dark alley, she felt not ready to go. Geez! That’s how the Master could reach her and persuade her to become a vampire. He didn’t promise her power – he promised her a life!”

 

Julie stared at her in consternation. “I had no idea”, she said finally. “But you only know how she felt when she was human, right? How would you know whether the vampire still felt isolated?”

 

“You’re right”, Buffy answered, “I do not have vampire Yuki’s memories. And to be honest, I’m rather glad if they stay out of my mind. Understanding your enemy is fine, but I can do without too much deranged vampire crap in my head. But I have learned that there is always some influence of the earlier human personality on the motivations and obsessions of a vampire. Honestly, considering all I see and feel from the girl Yuki, I have no doubt that vampire Yuki really was attracted to you. Maybe she wasn’t even aware of it herself, but I think she saw parts of her earlier self in you, and maybe some afterglow of that person deep within the monster admired you for the way you would not succumb to your loneliness.”

 

Buffy watched the other girl who gazed into the dark with watery eyes, seeming deeply lost in her thoughts for minutes. Then Julie finally turned to her, and Buffy saw a faint smile appear on her face.

 

“I wish I had known her”, she said thoughtfully, “the real her, I mean. The unhappy young woman. But there wasn’t a chance, was there? We were centuries apart.” She sighed. “I envy you for her memories, Buffy.”

 

Buffy pondered over a reply when she suddenly became aware of some motion in the direction of the pond. She turned her head and saw the shape of a tall, pale person standing in the water. The slayer tensed instinctively when she recognized the woman with whom she had fought to the death just hours ago. But as she got a closer look at Yuki’s face, she saw nothing of the vampire’s grim bloodlust. Instead, her face displayed confusion and insecurity, as she waited there motionless, naked and up to her hips in the pond. Buffy understood that it was the image of the human Yuki, eyeing them, or rather just Julie, with a shy and somehow apologetic smile.

 

Buffy looked at the blond girl’s reaction. Julie had gotten up to her feet and stared at the phantom with open mouth. Her body was tense and she trembled slightly. For a long time she seemed to fight a silent internal fight. Ultimately she answered Yuki’s smile. Apparently forgetting about Buffy and everything else around her, Julie undressed and walked into the water. The dark-haired girl watched her approaching and her smile became joyful. Finally Julie reached her and seized her arm. The girls embraced and their lips met in an eternal kiss.

 

As she felt the nightly forest dissolving, and her mind returning from the realm of dreams to the reality of her Sunnydale life, it occurred to Buffy that the image of these two lovers’ kiss, seen through her eyes, would also forever remain a part of the memories that were passed on from one slayer to the next.

 

 

 

\--------------------

 

 

 

_DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fanfiction and serves no commercial purpose. I neither possess nor claim any rights to BUFFY, THE VAMPIRE SLAYER or anything connected with it that is under copyright protection. This refers also to the character of Yuki Makimura, which has been introduced by Tom Fassbender and Jim Pascoe in the Comic book "False Memories", published at Dark Horse Comics._

_When I wrote this story, I tried not to contradict established Buffyverse canon. Any inconsistencies have to be judged under the first rule of Whedonites: "Joss is boss." ;-)_


End file.
